


Forgotten Mission

by DarkGreiga



Category: Tales of Vesperia
Genre: FanFiction.Net, Original Character(s), Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-12
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2019-11-16 02:31:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 41,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18085715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkGreiga/pseuds/DarkGreiga
Summary: Judith had always believed that her mission was to destroy the hermes blastia and the defeat of Adephagos was the end of her mission. Her continuous insomnia slowly made her remember that the destruction of hermes blastia wasn't the only thing she had to do as she started remembering things she might soon regret.





	1. Insomnia

**Author's Note:**

> I just got into the Definitive Edition a while ago and an idea struck me that results in this story. The story might take the Yudith pairing route unless I decided to do something else about the possible romance in this story. Why the two of them? Even if the game is leaning towards Yustelle, I still like these two fighting maniacs together and I really think that's fine for people to have different interest about OTP stuff.  
> Anyways, here's the short intro chapter!

Two years had passed since Yuri and his friends defeated the Adephagos to save their world. The blastia which had been an important part of the humans’ daily lives had become useless in exchange for the safety of their world, but it was the job of the Empire and the Union to make sure that the humans could survive even without blastia. The leaders of the world had already been busy handling the protection of their towns and cities as they could no longer rely on barrier blastia, so they had a few select mages to help with developing a new type of technology to help with people’s daily lives.

Proposals were made about how people could utilize the nature’s power for their daily needs or how the spirits could be used to power some strange device. Only a certain mage decided to think differently in a way that no one dared to think, but they knew that their research’s secrets would led them to a place they desired the least. Either that the origins of their research were meant to be kept secret, or those facts had to be twisted a little. They had to get the patent rights no matter what, because they had been promised the money and the possibility of being a noble.

Just as the mages were working for humanity’s sake, the guilds were doing all they could to help other people. Brave Vesperia, the guild praised and blamed for their efforts to save the world by sacrificing blastia was one of those guilds. With the small guild slowly growing due to the fame they earned from their travels, Karol managed to earn them enough money from various jobs to build an office in Dahngrest.

A small two-story building was enough for the small guild to get by, with the first floor as the main office and the second as the three founding members’ small bedrooms. Karol was mostly present in the office while training their new recruits as Yuri was mostly helping the people in the lower quarter and Judith was more frequently travelling around the world with Ba’ul. The group would meet once in a while when they had a big job to do together and they would sleep over in Dahngrest before they left the next morning.

The time had come once again for the three founding members and dog to gather at the office, but it wasn’t for a job. Yuri had himself chased out of the capital by the knights once more, so he needed a place away from the Imperial Knights. Judith had just finished a minor delivery job and was staying over before leaving again. Karol had just finished with his personal training menu for the latest two recruits and the small office had already been his only home since they managed to buy it.

As lively as the night in Dahngrest was, all the noises weren’t bothering the guild’s growing leader at all as he slept through the night. Yuri wasn’t in his usual night walk mood after being chased by the three most hardworking knights until he managed to sneak into a cargo ship just to get across to Capua Torim. Repede had already fallen asleep ahead as the excitement his human friend had caused had worn him out as well.

Judith was left restless on her bed as she couldn’t get much sleep unless she was too tired to stand. Her possible option was to ask Yuri as her sparring partner, but the lack of noise from the room next door was telling her that the swordsman had already fallen asleep. She could talk to Ba’ul until she was tired enough to sleep, but her quiet mind told her that Ba’ul was resting somewhere as well.

It wasn’t her first time lacking sleep, but it bothered her that she couldn’t sleep when she actually wanted to. She had assumed that once her mission to destroy the hermes blastia was fulfilled, she could live her life without worry and sleep in peace. The destruction of the Adephagos should’ve made all blastia, hermes type or not, completely useless and completed her mission. It had already been two years since then, but her insomnia still persisted.

Her mission was only to destroy those hermes blastia, right? Or was there something else she had to do but she couldn’t remember? Those two questions had been popping out in her head whether she couldn’t sleep at night, but she couldn’t find an answer to them. She felt like there was something else she had to do and it had to do with Hermes’ research, but she couldn’t remember anything about it.

Letting out a tired sigh, the Krityan sat up on her bed while hugging her legs as she looked ahead at the spear sitting at the corner of the room. The Brionac, the spear she was holding when she woke up for the first time in Myorzo, the spear she used to defend Ba’ul from the other Krytians’ curious stares, and the spear she used to pledge her oath for her mission. The spear was her beginning and the start of her new life after the Great War.

Judith moved over to the edge of her bed and took the spear in her hands, “To fix… something…” she ran her hand on the spear’s handle as she held it up to the moonlight from the other side of the window, “There’s something else you wanted to fix… right Dad?”

Judith put the spear against the wall before closing her eyes, trying to recall the events most people would try to forget. She didn’t care if she had to remember a past trauma as long as she could remember what she should have done next. Every time she did this, however, the only thing which came to her mind was the image of her father standing in his study while repeating the same words over and over.

_“I have to fix this… I have to… fix everything…”_


	2. Don't Forget Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After the two weeks of delay because of my dumb broken laptop (still not fully recovered, I think)... I can finally get this up. It's been sitting in my phone storage for a little over a week after I finished writing it, but I couldn't upload it because my laptop refused to load anything.
> 
> With all that ranting aside, I found an unfinished translation of Judith's light novels and that made me change the story a bit. Nothing major, because what I had in mind when writing the plot wasn't that much different from the novel's story. And the spoiler is little to none if you've finished the game, so don't worry about it. Now here's the second chapter!

The sunlight went through the bedroom windows as Judith slowly got up from her bed. She was feeling more tired than most nights she couldn’t sleep, but she had no other choice other than to get up and get ready for the day. Taking her spear and supply bag with her, she was ready to go and wander around anywhere the wind decided to take her.

“Good morning, Judith,” Karol was cleaning up his table from unused paper when he greeted her, “Uh… you’re not leaving without breakfast, right?”

“Good morning,” Judith let out her usual smile before putting her belongings by the dining table, “Of course not. I need all the energy I can get so I can handle the monsters more easily.”

“There’s no need to fight them anymore when they just run away at the sight of their friends’ brutal slayer,” Yuri’s voice from inside the kitchen, “But it’s really up to you whether or not you’re staying for a simple breakfast.”

“Oh? Do you really think I’m that brutal?” Judith let out a playful pout as she poked her head into the kitchen.

“Nice try, Judy,” Yuri turned with their dessert as breakfast on his hands, “No one in this guild is going to fall for that act.”

Judith chuckled before joining the two guys at the table, “I suppose so.”

Karol’s face dropped at the sight of their breakfast menu, “Sorbet again?” Karol looked up at Yuri with a frown, “Didn’t we have this too last night?”

“We only have the ingredients to make this,” Yuri took his first bite of his meal, “Didn’t you ask new recruits to replenish our food stock last week?”

“Oh, you mean the twins?” Judith joined into the conversation, “I think I saw them in the new casino in Nordopolica.”

“I think Judy’s gambling habit is starting to rub on them, boss… wait,” Yuri let out a sigh, before he realized something and looked at the Krityan with a serious look, “What are you doing there in the first place, anyway?”

“I felt like playing a bit of poker then, so I stopped by to see what is the new casino like,” Judith replied nonchalantly as Karol was looking gloomier and gloomier.

“I… I’ll write a letter of apology to Natz later… and ask for the repair bills for anything those two destroyed…” Karol replied weakly, obviously losing his appetite.

Yuri let out another sigh before taking Karol’s share of sorbet, “I don’t mind having a normal poker game with you, so you don't have to cause another casino to go bankrupt-”

“I didn’t,” Judith interrupted, “I only needed some extra gald for something.”

“Why didn’t you say so?” Karol turned to look at her, “If it’s not much, I guess we can lend you some.”

“No, I’d rather not,” Judith replied with an unexpected sigh, “It’s not much, but perhaps it’s better that I used my own gald.”

“Suit yourself then,” Yuri replied as he gathered their finished plates to wash.

Yuri dropped the topic at that, but Karol wasn’t going to let it end just like that, “Is there something you aren’t telling us?”

Judith gave him a nod, “There is, but I can promise you that this doesn’t involve the guild.”

“Okay… but-” the knock on the door stopped him from saying more as his attention shifted towards the opening door, “Welcome to Brave Vesperia’s headquarters!”

“A kid?” Yuri emerged from the kitchen to see the young visitor.

“H-Hello…” a young girl with dark brown hair greeted shyly as she held her stuffed wolf tightly.

Judith rose from her seat and approached the girl before she squatted down in front of her, “Don’t be scared. If you need our help, you can come and sit with us before you tell us your troubles.”

The girl nodded silently as she followed Judith to the table, “I… I want to find my Papa…”

“Finding a missing person, huh?” Yuri turned to his faithful canine friend sitting by his side, “Repede can track him easily if he can get his scent.”

“Um!” the girl suddenly sat up straight, “But Mama told me that Papa left after I was born…”

A look of uncertainty showed on Karol’s face, “And… how old are you…?”

“I’m nine…” hearing the girl’s answer, Yuri and Karol had the look which said that their chance of actually succeeding was little to none, especially when she didn't seem like she brought something which could've been a clue.

“Can you tell us a little more in detail about your father?” Judith asked as she smiled at the girl, “We will do what we can, but we need you tell us more about your father.”

The girl turned to the two guys before Yuri spoke up with a smile, “We can’t actually guarantee that we’ll find them, but it’s better than doing nothing,” Yuri turned to Karol, “right boss?”

“Yeah,” Karol replied with a nod, “So for us to be able to find him, we need more information.”

“H-Here’s a photo of my Papa and Mama,” the girl gave an old photograph to the three of them, “It was… before I was born…”

The colors in the photo had faded from either old age or the marks from being folded too long. Despite the worn condition, the photo clearly depicted a young couple with the heavily pregnant woman leaning against a man with darker hair and a wide scar across his nose. A couple of few tent-like objects were seen behind them, but the rest were too blurry for them to tell. As Judith took the photo in her hand, a small piece of paper fell from her hand.

“What’s this?” Yuri took the paper, “Behind the fifth tent at south, a building of rocks?”

“That’s where Papa was called for work,” the girl held her doll tighter, “But… but… he never came back…”

As the girl was sobbing, Judith put a hand on her shoulder and spoke to her softly, “Can you tell us your name?”

The girl hiccupped before answering, “L-Lucina…”

Judith nodded in understanding before she took her belongings and stood up, “I will find your father, Lucina. We accept this task in the name of the brightest star in the sky-Brave Vesperia!”

“W-Whoa! Hold on, Judith!” Karol stood up, “We don’t even know where we should find him!”

“I believe…” Judith glanced at the photo once more, “I might have been there myself with Ba’ul…”

“You should take Repede with you too,” Yuri told the Krytian as Repede went to her side, “He’s better when there’s something with the guy’s scent to work on, but I know he’s good at finding people.”

“You two aren’t coming?” Judith asked, surprised as Yuri was willing to part with his furry friend.

“I can’t,” Yuri let out a sigh, “I need to stay low because of the knights going around to try and arrest me again. Besides, the boss wanted me to train the twins in handling swords.”

“I can’t go either,” Karol replied, “There’s a guild meeting in the Union HQ and we need at least a reliable representative to come.”

“Okay. I’ll take Repede with me then,” Judith said as she was leaving, until a small hand stopped her. Judith looked at the fidgety Lucina before she handed over her doll, “Is this for me?”

“I-It’s… your payment…” Judith paused for a moment before smiling and gently shoving it back to her, “It’s precious to you, right?” the girl nodded, “Then you have to hold on to it for a little longer. I can’t accept advance payment this time.”

Lucina nodded in understanding, “Stay… safe…”

* * *

Continent of Hypionia, the southeastern islands. Judith remembered that the islands had become a temporary settlement for refugees from the part of the Great War taking place in Desier. It was the same settlement she visited the first time after she made an oath with Ba’ul. The tents she saw in the old photograph were the most prominent feature of the settlement.

Finding the man should be a little easier for her as he had an unusual scar, only if the settlement wasn’t completely deserted. There was no sign of life when Judith and Repede got off the Fiertia. The tents were still there, but most of them were in a bad shape. Some of the tents had transformed into decent homes made of stones and hay, which were the only logical places to start looking for a grown man.

_‘Behind the fifth tent at south, a building of rocks…’_ Judith recalled the address as she looked around with Repede slowly following her while trying to catch the scent of another person.

Repede’s ears suddenly twitched, as he picked up rustling sounds. Instead of their intended destination, Repede ran the opposite direction with Judith running after him, “Repede, wait!”

“Woof!” Repede stopped a few meters away from an old house and sniffed around the area. He walked closer to the worn out door and turned to the Krytian for a moment before he turned back to the door.

“Is there a person inside?” Judith asked, though knowing that the answer she would get from Repede wouldn’t be in a language she understood.

The door opened with a creaking sound before a pair of eyes in the distance made her subconsciously grab her spear, “Please! No more!”

“Don’t torture us anymore!”

“Please have mercy! We only want to eat!”

_‘Human voices?’_ Judith lowered her spear and moved aside to let the afternoon light brighten the dark room.

Three men were sitting on the other side of the room with their tattered clothes. They were looking at them in fear, possibly due to the weapons they were carrying. A small piece of strange colored bread was lying on the wooden floor with the crusts spread around them. The men were clearly malnourished and terrified as Judith and Repede tried approaching them.

“D-Don’t come! They’ll take you too!” one of them spoke, “You… you can’t come back!”

“AAAHHH!!!” another one who had a scar across his nose yelled in frustration, “I-It’s my fault! I keep on drawing people to their death!”

“Please calm down!” Judith tried calming the terrified men before the last of the three tried shoving her away.

Repede got between in time and bit the man’s arm, “Argh!”

The three men were once again backed into the wall, but their tension slowly faded when Judith put her spear down harmlessly and squatted down to their level, “Please, we’re not here to harm any of you.”

“What do you want with us? Are you going to take us away from this nightmare?” the man with the scar asked.

“Yes,” Judith gave him a nod, “I’ve been asked to find you by your daughter, Lucina.”

“Lucina…” the man whispered before he smiled weakly, “She really did give her life for hers…”

“I can take you all back to Dahngrest by air, so there’s no need to be concerned about transportation,” Judith spoke up, getting the man’s attention as she and Repede led the men out of the building. Once outside, Judith brought Ba’ul’s horn to her ear, “Ba’ul, we’re done here. Can you come pick us up?”

There was a short pause before the reply came echoing in her head, _“Understood. And Judith?”_

“Yes?” Judith noticed the concern in his voice, “Is something wrong?”

_“I can sense that something is bothering you. It’s much stronger than the time before you arrived there,”_ Ba’ul replied telepathically, _“There’s no way for us to read each other’s thought, but we can still sense each other’s feelings.”_

Judith closed her eyes as Ba’ul came into sight, “I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you until we’re finished handling this job.”

* * *

“So that’s what happened…” Yuri spoke up before he turned to Repede at his side, “Repede doesn’t usually bite innocent people for no reason, but I’m guessing he sensed a bit of aggression back then.”

“Woof!” Repede let out a soft bark before he left for his special bed in the room.

“Now that everything is done,” Judith rose from her seat, “I need to get going before it gets dark. Please tell Karol that I won’t be staying here tonight.”

“Hey, wait!” Karol’s voice was heard along with the sound of footsteps coming down from the upper floor. The young leader was holding a piece of paper while gasping for air, “We… a job…”

“That was fast,” Yuri commented before walking over to Karol, taking the paper before Karol collapsed on his feet, “Hey, this is a job from our naive princess!”

“Estelle?” Judith walked away from the door, “What does she need?”

“Don’t know,” Yuri replied as his eyes was still on the paper, “Long story short, she wants you and me to be at Zaphias castle tomorrow. She doesn’t mention what she wants, but Karol and the old man is in it too.”

“You’re not going to miss out on this job, are you?” Karol asked while still sitting on the floor.

“Don’t worry, I won’t,” Judith let out a smile before she went back to her walk towards the door, “I’ll come to the castle tomorrow.”

* * *

She stood in front of a charred rock in the middle of the remnants of a building. The wind of Mt. Temza blew her hair back and forth as she held on to a bouquet of small blue flowers.

“I’m sorry I don’t visit you often, Dad,” Judith spoke up softly, “I have the myosotis flowers this time. It's the rare kind of flowers you usually put on Mom’s grave and it’s only sold in Myorzo for a high price,” she put the flowers in front of the rock, “I hope you like them…”

Judith prayed silently as Ba’ul let out a low growl above her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit of trivia for the flower I used here, in case you don't know. The myosotis flowers are also called forget-me-not flowers and they symbolize the long lasting connection or the memories someone shared with another, which in this case, the memories Judith shared with her dad. Their relationship isn't explained much in the game, but it's pretty much covered in the novels.


	3. Old Memories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me present to you... my own version of Judith's past! (probably part 1) Enjoy!

The smell of curry spread in the middle of a room full of book stacks. The young blue-haired Krytian had to use a few worn books from the stacks for her to reach the small kitchen to cook, though the number of books used had decreased than it used to be. Being an eight-year-old Krytian would mean she had to go to school and learn how to be a proper Krytian, but studying had never been her most interesting subject. Cooking, however, was one thing she liked since she first started learning it. After all, there was someone precious to her who enjoyed her cooking the most.

Unfortunately, that precious person of hers had grown distant to her for the past year. Hermes, the Krytian who had been working for the Empire, had turned from a caring and attentive father to a mad and research-obsessed person. Judith couldn't tell what happened to her only blood relative then that he changed completely. All she could tell was her father's constant yelling in his studies before more crumpled paper was thrown out of the door. For some reason, she felt like his father was never on his own in his studies.

Out of curiosity, Judith left her cooking for a moment to peek into Hermes' study. Parts of blastia along with various books were all over the floor while her father was standing in front of his desk. She couldn't hear what he was saying from the distance, but she felt that he wasn't talking to her. He was hardly angry at her even if she decided to do things against his wishes, but she noticed that the anger was there and directed at someone else.

On the other side of the piles of blastia parts, Judith could see something like white cloth and it was moving. Another person, she assumed, must have visited her father for research related issues. From the way they were yelling at each other, she could tell that they were at odds with each other. The noise was making her head spin and she wanted them to stop.

"Dad! Dinner is… dinner is almost ready!" Judith's voice stopped the whole argument as Hermes was surprised to see her by the door.

"Judith…" Hermes looked at her worried face before nodding and giving her his now-rare smile, "Yes, I'll be right over after I'm done."

The father and daughter pair exchanged looks for a moment before Hermes turned to whoever it was with him as Judith slowly made her way out, "Okay, Dad…"

"I won't resume it and you can't change my mind about it," Judith stopped as she heard her father's voice once more, "I can't tell you why."

"Why are you doing this?!" a foreign angry voice replied, "Can't you see how much the Empire is willing to pay us for your formulas and my abilities to implement them?!"

"It's never about the money," the sound of footsteps could be heard as Hermes approached Judith at the door, "Please, I ask you to understand. I don't want to talk about this anymore with you. Go back to your family and take good care of them."

"I won't stop right here, Hermes!" the other person yelled angrily and kicked the nearby book stack.

Hermes simply ignored the new mess and approached the confused Judith, "Come and let's have dinner."

Judith silently nodded as she took her father's rough hand while trying to get a glimpse of the other person in the room. She could only see the person standing there, but with their back turned to her she couldn't see the person's face. She could only remember how their angry voice calling out to her father as they left the room.

* * *

Judith's eyes fluttered open and the familiar dim light of the stars in the night sky was the first thing to greet her. She was getting tired of either having a hard time trying to get some sleep or waking up in the middle of the night. In most cases of waking up in the middle of the night, it was always after she dreamt about her old memories before the Great War.

Her mission was done, wasn't it? So why did it feel like there was something else she felt like she should take care of? She had lost part of her memories from the shock of losing her only living blood relative to the war, so she felt that she must've forgotten that part along with her memories. She had been dreaming of things she believed to be part of her memories she lost, but they were mostly about her and her father after he found out that his research was hurting the world.

Then she realized something. That was the first time she dreamt about her father talking with someone else who dressed differently from other Krytians in Temza. Her father never mentioned a lot about his research to her, as she was never interested in studying. This might have been the reason why she was never told that her father might not be on his own when he developed the Hermes blastia.

Judith sat up on the bed for a moment, letting the wind blow her long hair back and forth as she recalled the dream she just had, "Those clothes… was there a mage in Temza…?"

Judith turned to look at the view from the window of the empty house in Myorzo, seeing the mountains miles away. Krytians on the surface could live anywhere, but some like the Krytians she knew in Temza preferred living in secluded places. Their attire was mostly suited for either researching or farming, but the clothes the person in her dream wore didn't look like it was common in Temza. If her father wasn't working with another Krytian, then could it be that mage was a human?

A moving silhouette snapped her out from her thoughts as she recognized it to be her Entelexeia friend passing by. Judith got off her bed before walking towards the window, looking up at Ba'ul as he flew by Myorzo. Both of them were connected emotionally, so Ba'ul was most likely drawn to her anxiety as she was trying to dig up her forgotten past.

" _You seem a little worried. Is something wrong?"_  Ba'ul asked telepathically.

"I just dreamt about Dad again just now," Judith answered calmly, "But he wasn't alone this time. I think I saw another person in his study, but I don't remember meeting him before."

Ba'ul went silent for a moment, flying over and out of her sight,  _"Why do you want to know about this person?"_

"Temza was destroyed from the war and Dad's research was destroyed along with it," Judith replied, "Even so, a lot of Hermes blastia still made it through without a scratch. I noticed that every time we found one to destroy."

" _Are you assuming that this person is involved in taking all of the blastia from the battlefield?"_  Ba'ul asked once more.

"I… I don't know…" Judith lowered her head as she frowned, "Dad had an argument with them, but that was all I can tell about this person."

Another silence came from the gigantic Entelexeia before he replied,  _"I may have seen this person you mentioned. I believe Hermes considered him as his personal assistant, although they didn't seem like they were in good terms during his last moments."_

"Dad decided to destroy the blastia he created after you took him to see Duke and the other Entelexeia," Judith added, "This person wants to continue with the research and this is where they were at odds with each other."

" _Correct,"_  Ba'ul replied, followed by a short silence,  _"And I believe you've met him as well. It was for a short moment, but you met him in the battlefield before I took you out of harm's way."_

Judith paused for a moment before letting a sigh, "I'm sorry, I can't remember anything about that. I only remember riding on your back at that time before I passed out and woke up in Myorzo."

There was another short pause,  _"I apologize. I shouldn't have brought that up. I wish that I could've done more for you and Hermes at that time, but…"_

"It's okay, Ba'ul," Judith let out a smile, "If it wasn't for you, I won't even be here to talk to you."

"…  _Yes…"_  Ba'ul's voice in her head was filled with pain and guilt, which she immediately noticed.

"Ba'ul?" Judith called out.

" _No, it's nothing,"_  Ba'ul quickly replied,  _"It's… quite rare of you to think back to your past."_

"Sometimes they come and leave my mind," Judith replied casually as she leaned on the windowsill, "There are times when I think about how I should help Dad before it was too late, but I can't learn how to use magic. I'm not good at studying like he was…"

" _But you're good at teaching at the very least,"_  Ba'ul commented,  _"You taught me to understand your language. Your princess friend seemed pleased as well when you taught her how to cook properly."_

Judith let out a chuckle, "Thank you Ba'ul, but I think you should learn how to speak to Yuri and the others by yourself. It'll be quite troubling for the others to communicate to you if I'm not around to help."

" _Er… yes, I'll try the next time we get another job,"_  Ba'ul replied nervously, getting a chuckle from his Krytian friend.

Judith leaned back a bit, "Estelle is a fast learner, so I don't think I deserve too much credit for teaching her. Rita is the same, though she seems a lot more interested in her books than cooking."

" _It's good to see that you're back to your old self, Judith,"_  Ba'ul suddenly commented,  _"I like hearing your stories about them, but it's getting quite late."_

"I guess it is," a yawn escaped her mouth, "It's fun talking to you too, Ba'ul. I think I can try and get some more sleep again."

" _Rest well, Judith,"_  Judith turned to the window to see that Ba'ul had flown away from above Myorzo.

Judith let out a smile as she whispered, "Good night, Ba'ul. And thank you."

Judith went back to the bed and lied down, thinking of how she could end up in Myorzo every time her past came back to haunt her. She wasn't too fond of Myorzo' cultures, but she would always find herself back in the city after she and her friends discovered how to open the gate years ago. The empty house they used to spend their night years ago had become her second house whenever she found herself back in Myorzo.

She never hated anyone in Myorzo and none of the residents in Myorzo hated her for being an outsider. Even when she arrived for the first time after her home was destroyed, the Krytians there welcomed her as if she had already been a part of them. None of them would turn her down if she wanted a place to stay, but she decided to stay outside the gates and be with Ba'ul instead. He was the only one familiar to her as everything around her then was weird for her.

But that was all in the past. Judith had decided to leave Myorzo with a mission to destroy all Hermes blastia. It was that mission which changed her life as she met her friends and joined a guild along with them. She could've lost her father, her only family, but her journey had introduced her to her friends who she could even consider to be a second family. It wasn't just her and Ba'ul anymore, because now it was her, Ba'ul, and their second family.

Her conversation about her friends with Ba'ul had helped her clear her mind as she could feel that her eyes were getting heavier and heavier. She was already tired and she could finally get some peaceful sleep with a clear mind. She needed all the energy she could gather to prepare for whatever job her princess friend wanted her to do.


	4. Castle Visit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This cooouuuld've been up a bit sooner if it wasn't for me finding and watching another gameplay for a weird game that might've fallen to the category of horror/supernatural (and probably gore as well). Other than that, if there's a mention somewhere in the game about the party's birthday (beside Yuri's), I'll have to apologize because I've most likely missed it. I'm going to check it when I play the game again to start my third playthrough. So anyways, here's the new chapter!

There was a meeting with the Council members at noon. Another site needed to be inspected after that. Formation for defenses in cities needed to be checked again. A few knights had to be sent to a few smaller cities to calm more protesters for their inability to use blastia anymore. Fund usage report needed to be written before the next day. On top of that, there was other paperwork to be done immediately. It was a lot of work to be done by a single commandant, but it had been a routine for him for the past two years.

As if his work wasn't making his head dizzy enough, the blond commandant had to listen to another person yelling in front of him. Flynn would occasionally nod to make it look like he was listening. He would listen to this person's entire complaints if only those complaints weren't mentioned over and over again for the past hour. This would be the first time he handled a direct complaint and he wasn't too fond of it.

"Commandant, isn't there anything you can do?!" the person asked. It was a man wearing the standard mage robe, but his hood had covered most of his facial features other than his googles and some wrinkles next to his left eye.

"I'm afraid I don't have the authority to change the Council's decision about your proposal," Flynn replied calmly, "If it's rejected then your proposal for the new blastia replacement isn't satisfactory enough for them."

Much to the commandant's surprise, the man slammed his hands on his desk, "That's a big lie and I know it! The previous commandant promised me wealth and nobility status for me and my daughter! You just don't want to do it because you don't even know me!"

Flynn took a piece of paper on his hand, "You are Dior Morey, a mage who has been working for the Empire since Alexei's election as the commandant," Flynn put the paper back on his desk as he looked up at the man, "Please refrain yourself from making such baseless accusations. I have documents for every member of the Knights and the mages working for the Empire."

"You, Commandant Flynn, is at the same position as the Council," the man, Dior, responded in annoyance, "You definitely have the authority to persuade the Council to change their decision about my proposal. This research of mine is the breakthrough this world is waiting for!"

"The new regulations from the Empire strictly disallows any use of blastia or any other devices with the same principle," Flynn replied as he slid a thin book to the man in front of him, "This book contains the details about the new rules Emperor Ioder had made regarding technology-related research," Flynn looked up at him with a polite smile, "I'm terribly sorry that I can't help with your cause. The Council and I don't have the authority to influence each other's decisions unless a discussion is to be made."

Dior seemed to have given up, though he still hadn't left Flynn's room, "… lower quarter…"

Flynn couldn't hear the man's whispering correctly, "Yes?"

"That man told me that the commandants of the Knights are destined for greatness and they're allowed to do what they can to make sure that the Empire runs as it should," the Dior replied as he turned back to look at the younger commandant, who was looking at him in confusion, "You're just going to pick a mage from the lower quarter and put them in a high position, just like how you are now. It's only natural for people of the lower class to resort to such tactics."

"Mister Morey, I can assure you that I did-" Flynn had stood up from his seat, only to meet Dior's finger in front of his face.

"I'm going to get rid of pests like you," Dior removed his finger from Flynn's face and walked towards the door, "This is only fair when lower class people like you steal other people's rights!"

With his door slammed shut, Flynn slumped back to his seat. He certainly wasn't expecting to meet a person like that when he decided that he would handle complaints on his own. But now that he knew how things would turn out, he couldn't bring himself to let his subordinates handle hard-to-please people. Hearing people's complaints would be added to his already long list of jobs as the commandant.

"Does the commandant handle consultations for weird people too?" a familiar voice was heard from the direction of Flynn's window, but the blond didn't need to see the person to recognize them.

"Yuri," Flynn called out as he read through his paperwork, "Coming into my room through the window again, as usual."

"And you're working too hard again,  _Commandant_ ," Yuri added the emphasis on his friend's title, prompting for Flynn to look up at Yuri as he approached his desk, "Don't you have your subordinates to handle these kinds of boring stuff?"

"Delegating too much tasks to them isn't a good example for the Knights. They need to learn how to finish their assigned tasks properly," Flynn went back into stamping some papers as Yuri took one of them.

"Weapon shop trades?" Yuri looked at Flynn as he continued to ignore him, "Wait, are you in charge of the weapon trades for the Knights? Shouldn't that be handled by Fortune's Market?"

"Not in this area, because the Empire and the Union have agreed that the Knights' equipment is the responsibility of the Knights and the Empire," Flynn casually took the paper off Yuri's hand, "Are you coming here on your own just to bother me?"

"No, Repede went through the sewers to Estelle's room. And besides, I have something else in here that I have to take care of," Yuri turned to the window and as if on cue, a yell came from below the window.

"Yuri Loweeell! I say, you get down here and face your punishment!"

"Get down here and atone for your crimes!"

Yuri let out a sigh, "Some stuff like those Tweedles down there."

It was Flynn's turn to let out a sigh as he stopped his work, "Yes, I've completely forgotten about their report the other day about you," Flynn looked at Yuri in annoyance, "You can at least report to any nearby Knights when you see a cheating buyer. There's no need for you to go and hang him like some kind of laundry."

"They're just standing there like statues, so I'm simply doing them a favor," Yuri replied casually as Flynn simply slammed his head to his desk, "Well, I'm going to see Estelle right now. Did she ask you to come by too?"

"She did, but I'm afraid I have to go with Sodia and the others for another site inspection," Flynn turned to Yuri while still having his head on the desk until he suddenly sat up, "No wait, the meeting with the Council comes first… no, I think I have to hand in the report…"

"Seriously, you need to give those Knights some job to do," Yuri went for the door, "Anyways, I'm seriously leaving now."

It was only moments after Yuri left that Flynn suddenly came bursting out of his room, running the opposite direction where he was going. He was just too responsible that he couldn't afford to be late even a second for a meeting or miss anything in his reports. Sometimes they would question why they could get along so well when their personalities were mostly opposites.

* * *

One step forward, a few paws back. Two steps forward, a dozen paws back. The dog was looking at her without showing any fear, disgust, or anything that would show other that he didn't want to be approached. He was so open to anyone else petting him but not to her for reasons she wasn't aware of. When she finally gave up, the dog just sat in front of her and let out a yawn.

"Are you still trying to get Repede to like you?" the sudden voice surprised her as she turned to see her Krytian friend, "Judith, you're here… Um… is Yuri coming too?"

"He definitely will, but I assume he's going to need to take care of a few things first," Estelle looked at her cluelessly before her attention turned to Repede as he approached Judith and let her pet him, "Is Yuri still taking his time with his troubles?"

"Sorry I'm late," Yuri came into the group with a casual apology, "I ran into Tweedle A and Tweedle B on my way here so I had to send Repede to you first while I took care of them."

"Yuri, please don't cause any more trouble for the Knights," Estelle scolded, "You should've let Flynn know if you have some trouble with them."

"Not when the poor commandant himself can barely keep himself together, that is," Yuri let out a sigh, "So, what do you want us to do? You did call Brave Vesperia for a job, right?"

"Yes!" Estelle put her hands together in excitement, "Come with me to the dining hall and I'll tell you everything you need to know!"

* * *

"There seems to be a lot of eggs and fruits here," Judith commented as she noticed the raw food on one of the tables, "They seem to be in good quality too. Are you going to cook for someone?"

"Before that," Estelle looked at Yuri and Judith with a smile, "Do you know what day tomorrow is?"

"Tomorrow?" Yuri rubbed the back of his head, "Tomorrow's Wednesday, right? What's up with Wednesday anyway?"

"Ah, I think I know what you're thinking," Judith replied, "Tomorrow is Rita's birthday, isn't it?"

Estelle gave her a nod, "Yes! I want to give her a proper present and I think it's better if all of us can make our own presents for her!"

Yuri was checking around at the ingredients, "I think I remember Rita putting a raw egg into our sandwich because it's faster than to cook them first," Yuri took one of the eggs as he played around with it, "Are you saying that you want to give her our cooking?"

Estelle laughed nervously, "I… I want to do it myself, but I don't know my way around the kitchen…" Estelle looked at them with expectant look, "But Yuri, you and Judith can cook so well. Patty is too, but I can't seem to get in touch with her lately. But anyway, I want to give her some cake all of us made."

"Well, I'm not exactly that good, but I guess I don't mind helping," Yuri continued to play around with the egg before Judith took it gently from his hands.

"Well then, shall we get started?" Judith asked before she went ahead into the kitchen.

"Right," Yuri took the bags of flour and fruits with him before turning to Estelle and Repede, "Repede, help me with that egg basket. Estelle, you can… just watch."

"I…" Yuri and Repede soon joined Judith in the kitchen before the pink-haired princess, "I'm coming too!"

* * *

Back in Dahngrest, the bar was packed even in the middle of the day as Raven, Karol, and Nan were having their lunch in one of the tables. Nan was eating quietly as Karol was busy in his head which left his food barely touched. Raven, on the other hand, had just finished another bottle of beer and took the next bottle from the table.

"Ya still got nothin' kid?" the dark-haired older man hiccupped before he gulped down some of the alcoholic beverage, "Estelle's not gonna be happy 'bout this. Ya know how she wants ta have a good surprise fer Rita."

Karol let out a sigh, "No, I still can't think of anything," Karol turned to Raven with a glare, "Besides, why are you drinking at this time of the day? You could've spent some time helping me with some present ideas."

"Come on, kid," Raven slammed the half-empty bottle to the table, "She's growin' up so wouldn't some nice swimsuit be da best choice? Why did ya think that's no good?"

"She'll know that it's your idea and you're going to be hurled by fireballs again, Raven," Karol was left to think again, not noticing that the girl sitting across her had stopped eating.

"If it's a birthday present for girls, how about things like dolls and stuffed animals?" Nan suggested, getting the two's attention, "I don't know what she likes, but most girls like those things."

Karol looked at her in surprise, "That's sounds like a good idea, but… do you like them too that you're suggesting them to us?"

"U-Uh… I…" Nan stuttered nervously, "Why do you think that I'll like those kinds of things?!" she stood up angrily as she took her food tray with her, "I-I'm going now! I… I have a job to do!"

"Ya have a lot ta learn 'bout da ladies," Raven commented as he drunkenly slid his beer bottle in front of Karol, "Ya can learn from da expert here…"

"Coming from you Raven, that sounds so wrong…" Karol responded before he eyed the barely empty bottle in front of him, "And I'm not old enough to drink yet…"

The response the young leader got from the former knight was just a wobble nod before he crashed to the table. Ignoring the drunken older man's snores, Karol would've considered Nan's idea for the present. After all, the crafting guild was one of the many guilds he had joined and got kicked out off years ago. The next thing he needed was the idea of what to craft and how many items he and probably Raven had to gather to make them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes: I'm trying to get that Raven speech right though... and will try better next time... Also, Rita's turning 17 in this story and I'm not sure if it's actually common practice anywhere else in the world to celebrate the 'sweet seventeen' or it's just a custom in my country. I'm putting it here for a purpose. Lastly, Karol hasn't reached the age to start drinking yet according to my country's laws so he's definitely going to decline.


	5. Reunion and Nostalgia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is almost abandoned for like almost a month because I've come into a brick wall and no words seem to be flowing... until last night... While I'm still trying to cope with this nasty writer's block, here's the next chapter!

She was already tired herself, but she felt that she had almost reached the conclusion of her ideas. Ignoring the escaping yawn, the renowned mage of Aspio continued writing down the theories she had come up with. Her tired eyes scanned through the dozens of formulas she had written on her note under the flickering light from a small candle on her desk.

The proud smile on her face soon faded as she crossed most of her writing as she let out a tired sigh. Seeing the little space left to write her next ideas, she ripped the whole page of the note and threw it away as a ball of paper. She was getting more tired and her brain was desperately protesting to get some rest for the night. Her fatigued head had refused to think properly when she wanted to finish up her theories so she could test them the next day.

"Nope, that's not good," the young mage spoke tiredly as she rested her head on her desk.

Rita wasn't being pushed beyond her limits by anyone about her research, but she couldn't help it when she thought of some ideas. A full blastia replacement was still far from her reach, but she knew that she was on the right track. She only needed some ideas on the energy replacement and the alternative formulas to work with them.

The young mage roughly took some scraps of paper in front of her as she tried reading its contents for the dozenth time, until another yawn escaped her mouth. She wasn't getting anywhere if she continued in this tired state, as the words she read couldn't get into her head. Her body was forcing her to rest and she finally decided to go with it.

Rita put the mess of books and paper scraps away from her desk to make some space for her to sleep. She was too tired to get up and walk to her own bed, so her desk would be just fine for a short nap.

A framed photo caught her attention once the desk had cleared up, which brought a small smile to her face. It was a photo of her, Yuri, Estelle, and the others which they took shortly before they took care of the Adephagos a couple of years back. Aurnion had been completely rebuilt while they were preparing for their big battle and Estelle had to insist on taking a picture of the whole gang before the camera blastia couldn't be used anymore.

"Estelle…" Rita let out a whisper as she put her head while she tiredly stared at the photo, "It's… been a while…"

The young mage let out another yawn as her eyelids grew too heavy to keep her eyes open any longer. A few hours of sleep would be best, so that she would have enough time and energy to continue working on her research.

* * *

"… ta"

She could hear a voice, but she was too tired to respond. It could be her imagination, though.

"… Rita"

This person obviously called out to her, but couldn't they just let her sleep her a bit longer? She needed to recharge before she could continue with her research.

"Rita… time to get up…"

Annoyed, the young mage finally opened her eyes to see the familiar pink head, "Estelle…"

"Woof!" the sight of the princess was suddenly blocked as Repede jumped into her view, surprising the now-awakened mage.

"Whoa!" Rita fell from her seat as Repede had surprised her by putting his paws on the edge of her desk, "W-W-What was that for, dog?!"

"Good morning, Rita," the mage's attention turned to the smiling princess, "Did you sleep well?"

"Yeah, I guess…" Rita got back to her feet and stretched out her sore arms, "Oh… that feels good-wait, how did you get in?"

"Estelle insisted on waiting for you to open the door until a few minutes ago," Yuri spoke up before pointing at her wide-open window, "We have to let ourselves in through your unlocked window."

"Right…" Rita saw that there were only Yuri, Estelle, and Repede in the room, "Things should be different if there's that one brat to pick my door lock again…"

"Karol and Raven should be coming as well with Patty too," the young mage noticed the Krytian emerging from her kitchen, "Estelle had everything planned out for your party, so there's no need for you to get anything from the store."

"Wait, what party… oh…" Rita had just realized what day it was as she shyly looked at her smiling friend, "T-Thanks… I guess…"

There was a clicking sound coming from her front door, "Okay, it's open!"

The door opened to reveal the former soldier and the guild leader carrying a medium-sized box, "I hope ya don't mind is comin' in! The boy had to unlock the door for us."

"Raven! Karol! I'm so glad you can make it!" Estelle was the one to greet them instead of the house owner, "Did the two of you come up with a good present for Rita?"

"Here," Karol handed her the box he was carrying, which turned out to be lighter than it looked, "Nan gave us the idea for these. Without her, we might not be able to come up with something good enough."

"That's because ya don't like my idea!" Raven protested, "If ya considered this old man's idea about a growin' lady's birthday present then some b-"

"FIREBALL!" before the former soldier could finish his sentence, the young mage had sent a few balls of fire towards him.

"HOT! HOT! HOT!"

As Raven was running away from the room to put the fire from his clothes, Estelle noticed that the blonde pirate was missing from the group, "Is Patty coming with you?"

"From the latest letter I got from her, she can't make it back to land until tomorrow," Karol was digging through his bag before pulling out different pieces of shells, "She sent these with that letter, though."

Rita looked amused as she stared at the shells Karol handed over. She wasn't expecting to get anything as a present and especially from Patty, who she hardly ever saw since they went separate ways. The shells were at least a bit nicer that whatever thing she expected the old man to give her and the plain box in front of her was also making her curious.

"What about this one?" Rita curiously opened the box and subconsciously let out a smile as she saw the items inside, "T-This is…!" she picked up a doll of herself, but her smile soon faded as she turned away in embarrassment when she realized the pairs of eyes on her, "Stop looking at me like that! I-It's not like I'm excited about them or anything…"

"Wow! Are they miniature dolls of all of us?" Estelle had dug into the box as well as she had picked up a few of them, "They're all so cute!"

Yuri approached the box and picked up the doll of Repede as the dog sat next to him, "There's Repede in here too. Even his dagger and pipe are nicely made too."

"Ba'ul is included too," Judith took out the doll of her gigantic friend, which was also bigger than the rest of the other dolls, "Karol, how did you get all of this?"

"I got in touch with my friends in the crafting guild," Karol replied, "It was so sudden, but they were nice enough to make them without asking more than the required-"

As Karol was explaining, the young leader's stomach started growling, which prompted Estelle to giggle, "Shall we eat lunch together? Yuri and Judith made a lot of food since yesterday, so we have plenty for dinner as well."

"Wait, how long are you planning to stay here?" Rita asked, "I have a lot of research materials to look into so-"

"Let's go and eat, okay?" despite the young mage's protest, Judith had slightly pushed her into the small kitchen as the others followed suit before the Krytian whispered to her ear, "After all, you should thank Estelle for doing most of the cooking today. Yuri and I mostly watched while she was cooking. I have to say that it was quite fun watching the hardly-experienced princess working in the kitchen."

"Uh…" Rita looked at Judith for a moment and then turned to Estelle, who wasn't aware of the conversation, "I-I guess…"

* * *

It was like two years ago when they were still travelling together. Estelle with the scolding when Rita snuck a book to read while eating. Raven with being picky about the dessert and left Yuri and Karol to take his share. If Patty were there, she would be busy trying to feed Yuri as well. Flynn on the other hand, would try to make sure that the whole party eat quietly and properly while trying to make Repede eat his own cooking.

Judith never expected that she would come across the friends she had now. She used to think that she would be spending her entire life destroying Hermes blastia with Ba'ul and that Ba'ul would be the only friend she had. It was thanks to them that she had something to live for after she had completed her mission. She had her friends and she had a job in the guild she initially joined out of curiosity.

The Krytian let out a sigh as she finished washing the dishes. It wasn't like her to feel nostalgic all of the sudden and she wasn't the type to actually like doing housework like washing dishes. She just felt like doing it because she was used to doing it as a child as her father was too busy to actually clean the house. It felt like she had been living in the past for the past few days as the memories of her past had resurfaced in her dreams.

It wasn't the time for to be worried about it, though. It was already late at night as the party had been playing various games Estelle had brought from the castle. It was clear that Estelle planned to put Rita away from her research for a little as she had been working too hard. It wasn't the last of the plan, as Estelle planned on taking the whole party back to Zaphias the next day and have the commandant to take a break as well. She was making sure that her friends were well-cared herself, but she couldn't do everything on her own.

When she left the kitchen, Judith saw Estelle and Rita already asleep on the wall at the other side of the room. Rita was holding the dolls of her and Estelle in her arms as she leaned on Estelle's shoulder. Raven was sitting on a pile of books as he was looking out the window with Repede and Karol sleeping nearby. Yuri was digging through the pile of unsorted books for a couple pieces of clean cloth and took it with him.

Raven noticed the swordsman's movement as he turned to see Yuri unexpectedly put the first cloth on Karol and Repede and the second one on Estelle and Rita, "Ya seem ta be good with takin' care of kids."

"Not really, it's more like they're attached to me for some reason," Yuri replied shortly before taking a seat near the book pile he searched through earlier, "Besides, I don't want anyone catching a cold by sleeping in this cold night."

Judith ignored the rest of the conversation between the two as she headed for Rita's study, which was filled with various books, metal parts, and some tubes with different-colored liquid in them. Books and paper were scattered everywhere in the room, which reminded her of the mess in her father's old study. Just like him, Rita also had a few pieces of paper stuck on the wall containing diagrams and formulas she could never understand.

When she looked at the young mage's desk, a familiar object got her attention as she picked up the framed photo, "Is this…"

A slight thud sound made the Krytian looked at her feet, where something had fallen from the frame. A smile came to her face as she picked up the object, which was none other than the thermo blastia she gave her years ago. It was well-cared even after the blastia couldn't work anymore.

* * *

It was a lie. The commandant was incompetent. The commandant didn't know what to do because he couldn't actually do what he was supposed to do. The world needed a blastia replacement, but his research was turned down just because it was considered to be irrelevant to the main objective of making a replacement. The new commandant didn't want to do anything with his research was considered to be against the new regulations.

Alexei had needed him for everything he wanted to know about Hermes blastia. His ambitions were noble to him, but the others couldn't truly see them. Alexei was gone and he was replaced by the lower quarter boy who had empty ambitions. This same lower quarter boy had helped taking his hero down and destroyed his whole ambitions. Not only that, this new commandant had stripped his nobility status before it was made official because his contributions were considered harmful.

Dior Morey, the mage who was supposed to be turned into a noble by Alexei, had his rights taken away by someone of lower class. A cheap tactic of revenge, as Alexei had noted before, as both of them had grown up as orphans of elite families who had their family taken away by someone of lower class. After everything he and Alexei had been through, he wouldn't stand still and do nothing.

The mage was wearing his usual attire as he stepped into the lower quarter section of Zaphias. The knights guarding the area didn't stop to question him as his attire had given out his identity as a mage working for the Empire. He didn't care if he was seen by the eyes of the people in the lower class, as they wouldn't be able to tell him off to someone else.

There was no need to hide to do his own thing in that place. It was cleaning night for him and it was the best for him to destroy the people who had destroyed him in the first place. In his eyes, the poor in front of him didn't deserve any mercy. He had to destroy them before they could destroy any more people of his class.

An unfamiliar formula was drawn under his feet before fire started appearing from the magic circle.

That night, the mage Dior Morey would carry out his revenge and clean up the filth, which to him was none other than the lower class people.


	6. Burned Away Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A reeeaaalllllllllyyy late update, but it's finally here!

The sun was barely up as the sky was still dark early in the morning. The blond commandant's brigade had just arrived at the capital's front gate leading to the public quarter. He had expected to see the regular sight of early morning activities on the other side of the gate, though he only found a damaged wooden gate and the lack of liveliness.

"What is going on…?" Flynn got down from his tamed rhybgaro without turning his attention away from the place where he grew up.

The public quarter was a mess and was void of people. Parts of buildings were left with charred walls along with ashes of whatever object it used to be. The path leading towards the lower quarter side of the capital looked like it was made of black flooring with some burnt smell around it as Flynn and his brigade passed by. Compared to what happened to the public quarter, the lower quarter was in a much worse state.

The whole area was a mess with charred objects all over the place. None of the buildings nearby was left standing as their wooden materials got burnt. The whole place was burnt down and there were no signs of life in the area. The lively lower quarter Flynn had left for a single day had been reduced to ashes.

"Commandant Flynn, what are your orders?" his faithful second-in-hand, Sodia asked.

"Knights! Search for any survivors!" the blond commandant called out to his subordinates. He saw his brigade spread out and dug out piles of burnt pillars and objects trying to find any survivors. When he saw Sodia about to join them in the search, he stopped, "Sodia, I have a special order for you."

"Yes," Sodia stopped in her tracks and turned to face him.

"I need you to contact the knights on charge of guarding the lower quarter. We need to know what happened here while our team was out," Flynn stopped to look at the broken fountain on the middle of the quarter, which had some parts burnt with little water left in it, "Also, get Captain Leblanc in charge of the search. There's something else important that I need to do."

Sodia watched her superior for a moment as he was still watching the remains of the broken fountain. Getting idea of what other business he had, she decided it was best for her not to get involved and saluted as she understood her tasks, "Yes, Sir!"

* * *

Judith was the first one to be awake among the group, just like how it was during their travels. Either her or Yuri would usually be the first one to wake up with Repede waking up shortly after his human partner did. Judith had already made herself busy with breakfast preparation in the kitchen while Yuri had just woken up from the sunlight on his face.

"Ugh…" the dark-haired swordsman covered his eyes from the bright sunlight coming through the window as he sat up on the hard floor he slept on. With his back against the windows, he wasn't aware of the small peepit by the windowsill before the monster pecked on the glass.

"Who's knocking on my door at this hour…?" Rita was the next one to wake up as she drowsily turned to the source of the sound, which was her window and near where Yuri was standing.

Yuri looked at the bird monster in confusion, until he noticed something tied to its feet. Recognizing the small symbol on it, he quickly opened up the window, much to Rita's protests, "It's the symbol of the Imperial Knights!"

"Is that from Flynn…?" Estelle asked drowsily as she watched Yuri taking out a piece of paper from the peepit's message holder.

Yuri didn't respond to her as he read the letter carefully. A shocked expression was written on his face as he looked up from the letter to the watching eyes of his friends. Repede let out a whine, showing that he could sense the uneasiness in his human friend's heart. In the middle of the silence in the middle of the room, Judith was the one to break the silence as she walked out of the kitchen.

"Breakfast is ready. Shall we go and eat?" Judith said as the attention of everyone in the group shifted to her.

"Judy," Yuri had snapped out from his shock as he looked at her seriously, "Can you call Ba'ul here right now? I need to go somewhere."

* * *

The group of six people and one dog froze in place once they got into the public quarter side of the capital. The only people they could see in the usually lively place were the Imperial Knights digging through various piles of burnt objects.

"T-This is horrible!" Estelle commented after seeing the state the capital was in.

"Didn't think that I'll be seein' another city this being burned ta the ground again since the Great War," Raven added before turning to Yuri, who was walking silently ahead all of them, "Hey, did Flynn mention havin' any survivors here?"

Yuri kept being silent with Repede faithfully staying on his side. They were watching the Knights pacing back and forth cleaning up the piles of rubble while trying to find any survivors. From the passing Knights, the swordsman could see the one person who managed to drag him and his friends to his destroyed old home.

"Flynn," Yuri spoke up quietly before he walked over to his best friend.

Flynn, knowing that the familiar person was standing behind him, stopped in the middle of giving orders to his subordinates. He didn't turn to face him, however, and his subordinates didn't bother to try and arrest Yuri once more as they had other important jobs to do. Flynn gave them the silent hand sign to dismiss them, but his second-in-command refused to leave his side.

"Sodia, please assist the other knights. I need to talk to Yuri myself," Flynn told her calmly.

Sodia looked at him for a moment, took a quick glance at Yuri, before she nodded and saluted, "Understood."

Flynn watched Sodia leaving to instruct the other knights and took a deep breath to explain the situation as clearly and calmly as possible to the incoming group. Before he could speak a word, his friend had already spoken to him.

"The Imperial Knights are supposed to protect the weak, remember?" Yuri's voice was shaking as he spoke, "The lower quarter has never been like this since…"

"We're still investigating what happened here last night," Flynn interrupted, "I've assigned a few knights on guard last night, but I haven't heard any news about their whereabouts."

There was a short silence before Flynn was forced to turn around and look at his friend face-to-face. Yuri wasn't looking too pleased after seeing the condition his childhood home was in as he glared at him, "Did the knights take lightly of their duties and run away? Didn't you say that you're going to reform the Imperial Knights and the Empire from the inside?"

That was an insult to his subordinates, but he couldn't lash out at Yuri when he wasn't in the right state of mind. Flynn took another deep breath to keep himself from being enraged and gently put Yuri's hand off his armor, "Please, Yuri, I'm as upset as you are now after seeing our childhood home destroyed. My brigade has just arrived here early this morning and we're still looking for survivors who might have witnessed what happened last night."

"I'll go and find them myself," Yuri responded as he started walking away from his knight friend with Repede slowly following him.

"Yuri…" Flynn watched as he and Repede left the group, unaware of another incoming guest heading their way.

"Yuriii!" the mention person ignored the call as his young pirate companion stormed to the spot where he used to be, "I was so worried when I saw the smoke coming from here last night that my crew and I came here as fast as a leaping marlin… huh? Where did Yuri go?"

Flynn looked at the direction where Yuri and Repede had gone to, "It's best to leave him on his own for the time being," Flynn returned his gaze to the newcomer, "Other than that, did you say you saw smoke coming from here, Patty?"

"Aye," Patty gave him a nod, "I was so worried that something could've happened to Yuri that me and the rest of my crew sped through the oceans!"

"If you don't mind, I might need to ask you a few questions about what happened last night, but…" Flynn looked over to where his subordinates where working to find people and fix the buildings.

"You can leave it to us, Flynn," Karol spoke up as he walked out of the group, "You can hire Brave Vesperia to help out taking care of things here while you talk to Patty."

"He is growin' and is more capable than ya might think two years ago," it was Raven's turn to speak, "As long as this old man's not gonna do any labor work, I don't wanna lose to the kid and help out too."

"Since this is a job for the guild, I'm helping out as well," Judith spoke up.

Flynn looked at them for a moment before giving them a nod, "Thank you all for the help. The knights are currently divided into teams for regular patrols, so we're quite short in manpower."

"We will do what we can to help, isn't that right Rita…" Estelle turned to the spot where Rita was supposed to be, only to see that the young researcher was looking up at the burnt building, "Rita?"

Rita stood still as she was rubbing her chin while looking up at the charred walls of the building remains, "It's not from spirit artes… and it's not from natural fire either…"

"Rita, is something wrong?" Estelle approached her, but Rita continued mumbling to herself until Estelle patted her on the shoulder, which snapped her out from her train of thought, "Did you find something?"

"Not yet, but I think I can say that the cause isn't ordinary fire," Rita looked up at the charred part of the wall, prompting Estelle to do so as well, "Look at that burnt wall. The spirit artes we're researching with the Empire can't still do this much damage. Normal fire will burn every flammable objects, but the wall looks like it made contact with a burning object and left a burn mark there."

"We've suspected that some sort of arte was used last night," Flynn responded as he approached the two girls, "I might need you to inspect a few things that might have something to do with the artes being worked on by the mages."

"Fine with me," Rita replied with a shrug, "We're still working on many things, so I won't be able to answer anything right away."

* * *

The group went separate ways, helping in any way they could to both find any survivors and restore anything they could from the lower quarter. On one side Estelle was helping the working knights by handing out rations or heal their injuries. On the other side Raven was watching Karol as he tried rebuilding one of the broken stalls. Above the remains of the roof, Patty was looking around the destroyed area with her binoculars. Judith, meanwhile, was looking around in the middle of the mess.

To see a destroyed place wasn't her first time, as she was there when her hometown was destroyed. Her memory of the destruction wasn't too clear as everything went by too fast for her to actually understand what was truly happening around her. All she could remember from that horrible day was the flames and destruction, along with the fact that she and her father didn't part in good terms.

A block of wood suddenly fell a few meters in front of her, snapping her out to reality as she instinctively brought her spear defensively. Seeing that there wasn't anyone around, Judith lowered her weapon down only to see a few pieces of broken rocks thrown over the wood. More projectiles were thrown out to the pile and she noticed that it was coming from one of the alleys.

When Judith tried to see the source of the incoming projectiles, Repede had come out from the alley. Her friend's loyal dog simply sat there in front of the alley while pebbles and shards of woods where being thrown out from behind him. She could make out her dark-haired friend's silhouette behind Repede, digging through the pile of rocks and wooden shards while mumbling things that she couldn't hear.

"Yuri-" as Judith stepped closer, the sound of something cracking was heard. She stopped in her tracks and looked at the ground as she had stepped on something. She picked up the broken photo frame she had stepped on and took a closer look at it.

The photo looked like it had aged for some time, but it was clear enough for her to see a dark-haired boy and a blond-haired boy riding on top of an old man's back. An old woman was standing beside him and laughing as she was holding up the dark-haired boy to keep him from falling. All of them were smiling as their picture was taken in front of an old building, with stairs next to it.

When Judith looked at the scene in front of her, she noticed the similarity despite the damage done to the area. Remains of the stairs were still there and near where Yuri was digging through the piles of rubbles. They were the same stairs leading to Yuri's room, as she recalled during one of her visits to Zaphias for guild work.

When she took another look at the photo, she could assume that the boys could only be Yuri and Flynn, riding on Hanks' old back. It would be best for her to give him the photo, but his loyal canine friend wasn't letting her pass. He wasn't giving her any aggressive behavior, but he was sitting in the way towards his human friend as a sign that he might've understood that Yuri wanted to be on his own.

"Don't worry, I won't bother him for the time being," Judith whispered as she turned around, taking the worn photo with her as she left.

"Damn it…" Judith stopped as she could faintly hear his voice. A frown slowly made its way to her face as she lowered her head, noticing the unusually voice coming from her swordsman friend, "You… you're too stubborn to just kick the bucket like this…"

" _Dad… please don't leave me…"_

The voice of her younger self came to Judith's mind as the pain of her past resurfaced, prompting her to quickly leave the scene. It wasn't like her to be like this after so many years and she wouldn't let anyone know about her past pain. It should've been burned down like the rest of her hometown and gone for good.

* * *

"Please, Lady Estellise, I'm perfectly fine!" Flynn had tried to gently push away the pink-haired princess in front of him as she tried making him sit on the bench the knights had prepared in the public quarter, "I need to hand in my report to His Majesty right away!"

"No! I cannot allow you to push yourself anymore, Flynn!" the commandant of the knights finally relented as he sat down, "You've been working here for longer than we all have. Ioder has also mentioned how you've fallen asleep during meetings with the Council after working on too many tasks!"

Flynn opened his mouth to speak, but anything he would say to Estelle would only end up with her saying that he should rest. Flynn let out a defeated sigh as he looked at her, "My apologies, Lady Estellise. I shall hand in that report after taking some time to rest."

Estelle gave him a warm smile, "That's good to hear," the princess sat on the other bench in across Flynn as her smile faded away into a sad frown, "I'm sorry to see your childhood home in this horrible state."

Flynn gave her a smile as he shook his head, "There's no need to worry about me," Flynn turned to the direction where the lower quarter was, "If anything, it's Yuri that I'm worried about."

"Ah, of course. This is also the place where Yuri grow up as well," Estelle looked at the ramp leading to the lower quarter as well, "I heard from Karol that he didn't quite like himself when he and the other arrived here when I was captured."

"He rarely shows it to others, but he truly cares for the people in lower quarter," Flynn responded, "He never actually knows his blood family, but he considers the people of lower quarter to be a part of his family. Hanks and his late wife had been his guardians for as long as he remembers, so it's quite natural for him to consider them like his own parents."

"I… see…" Estelle was left without anything she could respond with, as she still knew very little about Yuri's past despite knowing him for a few years.

"He doesn't understand one thing," Flynn added, getting Estelle's attention, "He's not on his own anymore. He has his friends with him. I just wish… he would share his pain with all of you… or at least, he could share it with me…" Estelle looked at him as Flynn lowered his head with his fists curling into fists, "I'm sorry, Yuri… Even as commandant of the knights, I still can't do anything…"

Estelle looked at Flynn for a moment, "I'm sure he will understand someday," Flynn looked up to see her smiling, "You're a good friend to him and I'm sure he'll listen if you talk to him."

Flynn gave her a smile as he nodded, "Yes, perhaps so," Flynn rose from his seat, "Thank you for listening to my story, Lady Estellise. I'm feeling a bit rested already, so I shall take my leave and report to His Majesty."

"Ah, please wait a moment," Estelle stood up and called out, "Can you please let him know that I'll have Rita and the other girls stay in my room for tonight? If it's possible, I'd like to borrow your room for Yuri, Repede, Raven, and Karol to stay as well."

Flynn gave her a nod, "Very well. I can let them sleep in my room and I shall let His Majesty know as well."

"Thank you so much, Flynn!" Estelle watched him as Flynn walked away before she turned to the direction where the lower quarter was, "I have to go and find everyone!"


	7. Family

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A late update, but with twice the regular length from me putting in a bunch of ideas in. I hope the length can make up for the late update, for now...

The night had come and the moon was shining above the remains of Zaphias' lower quarter. The pink-haired princess was looking out at the piles of rubble being cleaned up by the rest of the Knights. She let out a sad sigh as the images of the liveliness of the place used to be came into her mind.

"It's sad to see such a lively place get mostly destroyed like this…" Estelle spoke up with a frown.

"Yeah…" a soft reply came from the young researcher sitting on Estelle's desk beside her.

"Poor Yuri… I can't imagine how he felt when he found out almost the entire lower quarter was destroyed…" Estelle continued, still paying her attention to the sight of the destroyed place.

"Yeah…" another reply came from Rita, still with the same tone as before.

Estelle let out a chuckle, "Still, it's quite a surprise to hear that you're also openly worried about Yuri…" when she turned to see her friend, she saw that Rita was looking at a red and gold pendant, "Rita?"

"Yeah…" Rita simply gave a reply, though it wasn't the reply that Estelle wanted to know. As she was looking at the red gem from the pendant, Estelle's face came into view which surprised the young researcher, "W-Waaah! E-Estelle! What are you doing there?!"

"You weren't listening to me, were you?" Estelle looked at Rita with a frown for a moment, but she turned back to the view on the other side of her window, "The moon is pretty tonight… but there are hardly any people down there to enjoy it. Yuri… must've felt really sad to be left all alone…"

Rita looked at Estelle for a moment before turning her attention back to the pendant, "He'll be fine. He's got Repede and Flynn with him, so he's not all alone. And…"

"And…?" Estelle was expecting Rita to continue, but the young researcher had hidden her face from her.

Rita couldn't continue, with Estelle looking at her curiously, "A-And nothing! I don't have anything else to say!"

Rita put the pendant she was holding rather loudly as she suddenly rose from her seat, getting the attention from Patty and Judith, who were already making themselves at home on Estelle's huge bed, "You're going to break her table like an orca tearing its prey."

"S-Shut up!" Rita took another look at the pendant she was holding before letting out a sigh to calm herself down, "Just… let me continue trying to analyze this object in peace."

"If that's the case, shall we turn in for the night ahead?" Judith suggested, "I'll need to turn off the light so we can get some sleep."

Rita turned to Estelle, who was confused at first, but finally got the message about the lights in the room, "I suppose… the small desk lamp you gave me before is good enough for you without bothering the rest of us?"

"Fine, just give me some light so I can see what I'm supposed to see," Rita gave her a shrug as she headed back to the pendant, with Estelle turning on the oil desk lamp Rita had made for her before she turned off the light in the room.

* * *

An hour had passed, but none of the girls had fallen asleep yet. Estelle, Patty, and Judith were sharing Estelle's king-sized bed with Rita still working on Estelle's desk. Judith had rolled to her side, facing away the rest of the girls as she took out the old photo from her pocket. Using her now-bare hands, she wiped the remains of the dirt from the surface of the photo as she looked at the smiling faces of the people in the photo.

The wind coming from the small openings of the window blew her untied hair as she tried to recall her old memories riding on top of Ba'ul's back as a child. The wind was blowing her then-short hair, with her father sitting behind her. The memory was kept by her father in the form a photo, taken with a camera blastia her father had made. For her, that memory was still there in her mind even without the help of the blastia.

"Um… is everyone asleep yet?" Estelle suddenly broke the silence in the room, also breaking Judith's travel down the memory lane.

Judith kept herself turned away, hoping that Patty wasn't asleep as well to reply the princess. The bed slightly shook, making Judith quickly hide the photo away before someone else saw it, "I'm too worried about Yuri to get my beauty sleep…"

There was another short silence after Patty's response was heard, but Judith wasn't in the talking mood about her family. She could assume that Estelle had looked over at her, but the princess wasn't trying to see whether she was awake or not. The sound of light clanging coming from Estelle's desk had also come to a stop, giving the sign that Rita was still awake but was paying attention to Estelle.

"I… I'm also worried about Yuri and Flynn as well," Estelle spoke up softly, thinking that her Krityan friend was sleeping and that she should keep her voice down, "I can't say I understand how he must have felt because I don't remember my own family, but… after learning a little about Yuri's past, I think I know how hard it is to lose someone who has been with you for most of your life."

Rita was looking at her for short moment before she turned her attention back to the dismantled pendant in her hands, "Yeah…"

"Rita?" Estelle noticed her friend's unusual tone, seeing the young researcher going back to working on the pendant, "Is there something wrong? Or…"

"No, it's nothing," Rita quickly replied without turning her head away from her work.

"Hm… something smells fishy here…" Patty commented, but she wasn't getting any response in return.

"Speaking of which," Estelle turned her attention to the young blonde pirate, "Patty, I don't think we've heard about more about your past after you recovered your memories. Do you still remember how your childhood used to be like?"

"Hm…" Patty crossed her arms as she leaned on the big pillow, "My memory as a young lass is still as hazy as a foggy sea, but I remember growing up with Seifer and formed the Siren's Fang together."

"I see…" Estelle turned to Rita, who had got herself back to her business on the princess' desk, "How about you, Rita?"

Rita had stopped tinkering with the pendant for a moment, but her attention hadn't shifted away from the item, "I don't remember anything about my dad. I barely remember my mom's face because she died when I was little."

"So I guess everyone is an orphan-"

"But," Rita continued, cutting off Estelle, "I remember having some kind of home-cooked meals sometimes in front of my door. I still don't know who put those there and none of the mages in Aspio admitted doing that for me anyway. It's kind of strange, but those meals were out there anytime I finished my research."

"Oh! Could it be your father?" Estelle concluded, "Rita, you should try-"

"I doubt it was his doing," Rita cut off Estelle once more, but with monotonous voice, "If he truly cares about me, then there shouldn't be any reason for him to leave in the first place," Rita let out an annoyed sigh before she turned her head around to see Estelle, "Besides, don't you think there's another person here that you haven't asked."

"Judith is sleeping, you shouldn't bother her!" Estelle scolded, turning over to Judith, "She came back here last, so she must've been so tired."

Rita glanced over to the Krityan, who wasn't joining into the conversation the entire time, "Yeah, sure," Rita gave her a shrug as she turned back to her work, "Judith  _is_  sleeping."

She wasn't, and she was paying attention to the conversation. Rita wasn't watching her, but the tone of her voice was giving her the sign that she should've said something. Rita knew about Judith's father and she was still the only one who knew about it other than herself. Being Hermes' daughter wasn't a secret, but she didn't feel like she had the need to tell everyone about her past. Her mission was done two years ago and she didn't have any reason to bring up the topic of her family anymore.

"Rita, you should get to bed as well," Judith could hear Estelle's voice from behind her, "It's already late at night and we need to be prepared for tomorrow in case anything happens."

"I'm not done yet," Rita replied, "I still need to find out what this is and how it works. This thing can give me some ideas about what blastia alternatives I can make."

"I know you love your work, but I do worry about how you stay up late every time," the bed moved once more as Estelle got off the bed, "Please, Rita. I don't want you to be lonely when you're the only one awake for the rest of the night."

"W-What's with that idea about me being lonely because of a nonsensical reason?!" Rita strongly denied, though she quickly calmed down when she saw the surprised Estelle, "W-Well, if you want to me to get to bed early… I'll finish things up quick…"

Estelle let out a chuckle, "Thank you for listening to me, Rita."

"W-Whatever," Rita gave her reply as she stood up and stretched herself, "I can't think of anything about thing… I need more information," Rita sat on the edge of the bed, next to Estelle, "Hey, are you sure your bed is big enough for all four of us to sleep on? I can sleep on the desk if it doesn't fit."

"You… don't want to sleep here…?" Estelle asked with a disappointed tone, "But I thought it could be fun if all of us sleep together like this, like when we were travelling together…"

"I-It's not that I don't want to sleep there, it's just…!" Rita slightly raised her voice, a blush appearing on her face, "N-Never mind, I'll go to sleep on the bed with you guys…"

Once Rita had joined the three on the bed, Estelle bid them goodnight, "Good night, everyone."

The room went silent once more as the girls turned in for the night, save for the Krityan who had been awake the entire time. She would have stayed up through the night trying to recall the familiar feeling of a loss she had, though she would need to save energy for anything that they would be doing on the next day. She shoved away the blurry memories deep into her mind as she tried getting some sleep for the night.

* * *

The blond commandant was walking through the lower quarter, which had mostly been emptied out as the Knights had mostly turned in for the night. The sounds of broken glass and pebbles being stepped on were the only things Flynn could hear when he passed by the broken fountain. Repede's bolt-shaped tail was sticking out from the other side, which prompted him to stop on his tracks.

"Yuri," Flynn could tell that his friend was there, hidden away behind the fountain.

Yuri didn't respond, nor did he turn to his childhood friend for a simple friendly greeting. He only sat there silently with a hand on Repede's back. There was no sign of him crying, though his facial expression told him that the swordsman was feeling torn after seeing the lower quarter's condition. Knowing him for so long, it didn't come as a surprise for Flynn.

"I'm sorry, though I'm aware that apologizing can't turn anything back in time," Flynn spoke up once again.

"Yeah," Yuri gave him a short response, though the expression on his face hadn't changed at all.

"I know you better than anyone, Yuri," Flynn's tone softened, "You were like this too, when Hanks' wife passed away."

"So?" Yuri asked in annoyance, "That doesn't have anything to do with what happened here."

"No, it doesn't," Flynn shook his head, "I just want to tell you that you're not on your own in this. Not now, and also not then."

Yuri let out a sigh before getting up, looking at Flynn with an annoyed look, "I don't need your lectures anymore, Flynn. I'm fine!"

Yuri walked past Flynn, though Repede wasn't following him. The dog was looking at Flynn as the Knight picked up two pieces of broken wood sticks nearby, "I'm not planning to have an argument with you tonight," Flynn turned to Yuri, who had stopped walking, before tossing one of the sticks towards him, "Don't you remember? We've always had our arguments in the form of sword sparring."

Yuri turned around, looking down at the wooden stick near his feet, before he picked it up, "We're not kids anymore, Flynn, and I don't feel like going along with a dumb revenge after I won against you last time."

"I'm not planning any kind of revenge," Flynn pointed his wooden stick at Yuri, "How about it? You've always forced me to spar with you as kids, but I'm the one asking you to do it this time. Just a friendly spar, just like the old times."

"Don't you think there's something else more important for you to do?" Yuri wasn't looking too happy, but he didn't throw away the stick he was holding and instead crossing it with Flynn's, "It's not the time mess around-"

"Here it comes!" Flynn cut him off as he knocked Yuri's stick to the side and pointed his own to Yuri's face.

Yuri dodged the incoming stick before switching his stick over to his left hand to counter, meeting his stick with Flynn's. Knowing Yuri's style of fighting, Flynn used his shield to block Yuri's incoming fist and pushed him to the side. The force managed to push him, but he used some of the force to propel himself back to gain momentum for a counterattack.

Yuri launched himself against Flynn, who was ready to block with his shield. Yuri's swings managed to hit either Flynn's stick or shield, but not Flynn himself. He wasn't trying to hurt his friend, but the expression on Flynn's face made him feel upset. He had won against Flynn once, but this time he wasn't winning in a simple spar with wooden sticks. He wasn't even close to a winning position and Flynn was looking at him with pity.

He wasn't going to act like the child he was before and try to win however possible, but he couldn't stand being pitied by his childhood friend. He thought he had grown out of his childhood rivalry with Flynn, though he wasn't sure if winning against him once more was what he wanted the most here. There was only one thing he could feel right now and that was rage, but not towards Flynn.

"Hah!" Yuri put the last ounce of his strength on his swings, which only hit Flynn's shield.

Yuri was expecting Flynn to come out from behind his shield to counter, only to have himself pushed hard towards the fountain. As he was falling, Yuri quickly grabbed Flynn's shield and dragged him into the shallow fountain water. The two went into the water with a splash, once more breaking the silence of the night.

* * *

"I… won…" the nine-year old Flynn was panting while holding a small wooden sword with both of his hands, "You're doing… firewood duties… again…"

The nine-year old Yuri was lying on the ground, also panting, "No… I won't… do it…"

"Come on… you promised…" Flynn walked over to his dark-haired friend, "If I won, you do it!"

Yuri looked at him with a frown as he folded his arms, "But you always win, Flynn. I'm sick of buying firewood every time!"

"Come on, beat me…!" Flynn put his wooden sword in front of him as Yuri got up to his feet, though both of their stances were wobbly from exhaustion.

"I. Will. Win!" Yuri threw away his wooden sword and ran towards Flynn, pushing both of them to the fountain behind them.

The loud splash sound gained the attention of the people around them as the two boys' heads popped out from the water. Not feeling satisfied with pushing Flynn into the water, Yuri splashed some water towards his face before pushing him once more for an underwater brawl. With the boys' brawl splashing water everywhere, the people stayed out of the way to keep themselves dry.

"S-Stop! Stop it! Yuri!" Flynn was struggling to get away from Yuri as he kept chasing him around.

The door of the house in front of the fountain opened, revealing an old man as he walked out of the building, "What is going on…?" the man turned to the direction of the fountain, shocked at the sight of the fighting boys, "Yuri! Flynn! Stop fighting this instant! And get out of the fountain!"

The old man's voice was enough to stop Yuri and Flynn from fighting, "Great, Hanks is here. It's your fault for yelling so loud, Flynn."

"H-Hey!" Flynn followed Yuri as he came out of the fountain with clothes wet all over, "I didn't start the fight!"

* * *

The sky was getting darker as the day was turning into night. Yuri still had his wet clothes on as he was sitting in front of a small fireplace with a frown on his face. His sight of the burning flames was soon covered as a dry cloth landed on his head, "Hey! Watch it!"

"Sorry," Flynn's voice came from behind him, "Hanks lent us some towels, so let's go and dry ourselves up."

"Hanks, huh…" Yuri whispered as he rubbed his hair dry, "I thought he only cared about you…"

Flynn let out a sigh, "I got yelled by him too, you know," Flynn sat beside him, taking off his wet clothes, "And we won't be in trouble if you'll just go and get some firewood for Hanks like you promised."

"But I'm always the one who gets it!" Yuri angrily put the towel back to his side, "I'm tired of bringing the firewood back and forth-"

"I'll help, okay?" Yuri was looking at Flynn in surprise, "What? Hanks is like a family to me too, so I want to help him anytime I can."

"Family, huh…" Yuri turned away from Flynn, though his downcast expression was clearly visible, "Alright, fine…"

"Okay, now let's go and-" Flynn was getting up, but stopped when he heard the sound of coughing coming from the room next to them.

"Are you okay? Do you want me to get some water?" Hanks' voice was heard from the thin walls, "When the boys are done changing, I'll have Yuri and Flynn get some medicine-"

"It's… okay, dear…" the weak voice of a woman was heard, "Let them… act their age… and have fun…"

"Are you sure?" Hanks replied, "You don't look too good."

"I'll be… fine…" the woman replied weakly, "Just… take care… of them… like a parent… would…"

Yuri and Flynn were listening into the conversation, until it ended with silence. Both of them went quiet, until Flynn decided to speak up in a whisper, "Yuri, she…"

"She'll be fine," Yuri gave him a short reply, but without any sort of optimism he always had. Yuri got back to his feet and flung the towel over his shoulders as he walked away silently.

"Where are you going?" Flynn asked.

"I'm going to change," Yuri looked back at Flynn from over his shoulder, "Come on, we need to hurry and get her some medicine."

"O-Okay…" Yuri could hear Flynn's reply as he turned around to head for the inn where he was staying.

Yuri would have openly said that he was an outsider to the people of Zaphias' lower quarter, but inside he felt like everyone in lower quarter was a part of his family. He and Flynn had grown up together in the lower quarter, but Flynn had an actual family instead of adoptive ones Yuri had. He would feel jealous when Flynn looked like he was everyone's favorite and especially when Hanks and his wife treated him differently compared to how they treated Flynn.

He had been with Hanks' family for as long as he remembered and he subconsciously believed that Hanks had always been his father figure and his wife as his mother figure. Flynn came to the lower quarter and he had become his adoptive brother. He had a family there, even if they had no blood relation to him. Blood ties didn't matter to him.

His mother figure had been fighting for an unknown chronic illness and he felt like it was the best thing he needed to do for her. He considered her and Hanks to be family though one-sided only, but hearing what she said made him change his mind. Buying her some medicine from the public quarter wasn't a hard thing to do as the expenses would be handled using Hanks' savings. It would be the first thing he did for the family who had always been with him and he hoped that it wouldn't be the last.

Little did he know, that his wish wasn't going to come true.

* * *

"My apologies and my condolences, Mr. Hanks," a woman with white robe spoke up as she stood in front of the door, facing Hanks, Yuri, and Flynn.

"I… see…" there was sadness clearly written on Hanks' face, "Don't worry, you and your team have done your best to save her. Please forgive me for not having too much money to pay for your efforts."

"It's the least I can do for her," the woman replied softly before bowing slightly, "If you excuse me, I'll be on my way."

Flynn and Hanks watched as the woman left, "N-No…"

"She had lived a good life and it was her time, after all," Hanks spoke up weakly before he silently went through the door the woman was blocking.

Tears were starting to fall from Flynn's face while Yuri kept his head lowered the instant he heard the news, "Yuri, let's-"

As Flynn was going to pat his shoulder, Yuri quickly smacked his hand away, "She can't be… She can't be gone!"

Yuri ran away past him, exiting the building into the rain outside, "Yuri! Wait!"

Flynn ran out as well, but Yuri was out of his sight. He ran through the rainy lower quarter looking for his best friend, only to find him hiding away under the wooden stairs leading to his room. Yuri's rare sobs were heard blending in with the sound of the falling rain as Flynn walked closer. Yuri didn't bother hiding his tears as the rain and his soaking wet figure had done the job for him.

Yuri looked up at the newcomer, who was also looking down at him with tears flowing from his eyes. Crying for them was a rare sight, but both of them crying together was an even rarer sight. They weren't related by blood and they weren't related to the passing woman. Their hearts were connected, and that they were all connected as a family.

The sky was raining, crying over the loss of a life in the lower quarter. Yuri and Flynn were crying over the loss of an important family member.

* * *

"Just like old times, huh…" Yuri commented with a small grin, soaking wet from being pushed into the fountain, "I can't say that I miss being wet from swimming in the fountain."

"It's the only way I can think of to get you to listen," Flynn let out a chuckle, "I'm sorry if it's too much. If Hanks were here, it'll most likely be me who'll get scolded for starting up a brawl."

"Yeah, right," Yuri returned with a chuckle, "So, what's so important that the commandant of the Knights himself have to tell me?"

"You're working too hard, Yuri," Flynn told him, "Capt… Raven told me that you've been taking a lot of guild requests, particularly the ones coming from Zaphias."

"Huh, I guess I did," Yuri gave him a nod, "But you're one to talk yourself. Estelle told me that you've fallen asleep while standing a few times and you've mistaken a decoration for her."

An embarrassed blush appeared across the commandant's face, "W-Well, the color of the flowers is the same as-"

"I think you're the one working way too much here," Yuri added, "And me overworking myself isn't something that important to say. I guess you have anything else to tell me then?"

Flynn coughed, "Y-Yes, there is," the blond commandant looked at him with a serious look, "I can't say for certain, but I might have a clue about the person who did this to the lower quarter."

"I'm listening," Yuri's expression turned into a serious one, "Do you know who they are?"

Flynn shook his head, "Not yet, but I've found something that might belong to a mage working in the castle. I've given it to Rita for now so she can take a look at it and it looks like Raven also recognizes that object."

"Did you find anything else?" Yuri was getting impatient, "I want them to pay for what they did to Hanks, Ted, and the others."

"I have… some possible suspects…" Flynn added, "Come to my office and I'll tell you more… wait, do you want to go and get changed first?"

"Nah, I'll just borrow one of your shirts," Yuri turned to Repede, who was faithfully watching the two from quarrelling to reconciliation, "You'll come too, Repede?"

"Woof!" Repede got back to his feet as well, going to Yuri's side.

"Alright, it's settled then."


	8. Mysterious Mage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for yet another long delay, though not intended as well with me switching programs just to write because MS Word decided not to work for me anymore.

Flames burning everywhere. Pain could be felt all over the body. The blurry vision of gigantic monsters tearing and burning down well-armored Knights was visible in the background.

The background… behind a big figure who felt so familiar. The one figure covering another person who was smaller. Who were they…? Every movement made the pain even worse with a pounding headache added to the set. With the pain, it was hard to tell who they were.

A metal object hit the ground with light clanging sound. The wind blew close by, followed by the sound of something big howling. Something or someone was calling to get away to safety.

Some warm liquid had made its way to the face, as the bigger figure fell to the ground. A touch of warm hand could be felt, but the warmth of that hand slowly slipped away.

A bright light came after, along the ear-piercing scream echoing throughout the burning field.

* * *

Judith jolted up from the bed with a gasp with cold sweat dripping from her face. Cold wind blew her long blue hair, realizing that she had just woken up from a bad dream. Or rather, another one from her series of bad dreams. Wiping the cold sweat from her face, she took a deep breath to calm herself down and look at her surroundings once more.

Patty was sleeping in the middle of the bed next to her, hugging a small Yuri doll as the young pirate smiled in her sleep. Estelle was sleeping peacefully next to Patty, with Rita clinging to her arm from the other side of the bed. The three of them weren't bothered by the sudden movement Judith had caused and kept on sleeping through it.

Judith let out a sigh as she sat on the edge of the bed, thinking that she would need some fresh air. She could have some time to take a short night walk, but the constant nightmares had taken away her sleeping hours too much that it was wearing her out. She couldn't tell how long she had been asleep, but she could use a few more hours to try and recover more energy.

It wasn't something that would worry her, as she believed that the nightmare was just a nightmare. It couldn't be anything else and she hoped that would be the case.

* * *

The sound of footsteps echoed in the empty hallways as Yuri and Repede followed Flynn to his office, with Yuri's and Flynn's hair still dripping wet.

"I'm surprised that the commandant keeps his clothes in his office rather than his room," Yuri suddenly spoke up, breaking the silence, "I guess your office also acts as your room when you're too busy to walk over to your own room?"

"I only have some spares in my office, but I don't sleep in the office anyway," Flynn replied, "There's no place for me to sleep comfortably in the office, so I have to head back to my room once I've finished work for the day no matter what time it is."

"You can ask Estelle to have your room and office in the same place then," Yuri suggested, "You'll probably fall asleep in the hallway before you even reach your room."

Flynn let out a sigh, "I'm not like you, Yuri, that's what happens to you every time you spend the night at the bar in Dahngrest. I've never fallen asleep in the middle of the hallways."

"Oh, that part," Yuri replied casually, "Yeah, I guess recall Judy and Repede finding me and had those red-heads carry me back. It's not that big of a deal though, those two are causing bar fights more often than me falling asleep."  
Flynn let out another sigh, "That's not something to be proud of, and you do realize that's supposed to be my line?" Flynn stopped in his tracks and right in front of a door, "Anyways, we're here. I'm using Alexei's old office and I don't want to force my selfish wishes to Lady Estellise."

"Whatever," Yuri shrugged as he casually opened the door, "Let's just get things done quick. I'm tired from all the excitement today."

"Yeah, I'm sorry about that," Flynn went into his office once Yuri entered.

The familiar sight of spiky hair popped up from behind Flynn's couch as Yuri was making his way towards Flynn's closet, "Huh?"

"'Bout time you kids show up! You're makin' ol' Raven here lose more sleep!"

Flynn stepped in front of the older man and bowed, "I apologize for the wait… uh… Raven…"

"What are you doing here?" Yuri asked as he poked his head into Flynn's closet as if he owned the place.

"I brought him here because he might know something," Flynn joined him by his own closet, snatching away the white shirt his friend was holding, "Not that one!"

"I'm not into your fancy and expensive shirts, Flynn," Yuri responded as he took a different shirt, putting it on, "So what do you think an old man like him will know anyway?"

"Hey, easy on the old man, will ya?" Raven protested before Yuri and Flynn joined him on the couch, "Your commandant friend here asked me ta come here after he found somethin' like a blastia that looks like one I think I saw during the Great War."

"You  _think_  you saw one?" Yuri asked sarcastically before he looked at Flynn.

"I know he can be trusted, if that's what you're thinking," Flynn responded, "He has been a captain of the Knights and Alexei's-"

"Stop mixin' me up with that Schwann guy, will ya?" Raven leaned on the couch in annoyance, "I'm Raven! R-A-V-E-N!"

"Y-Yes, I apologize," Flynn responded, "Please tell us what you saw."

"Hm… I didn't get to see much…" Raven replied as he put his fingers on his chin while trying to recall his old memories, "I think I saw somethin' glowin' red before everythin' went blank, like that thing ya gave ta Rita earlier…"

"Yeah, that's probably the light you see when you were dying," Yuri responded sarcastically.

"Hey, can't ya go easy on this ol' man?" Raven responded, looking at the younger man as if he was offended, "Ya can't expect me ta bring back ol' dyin' memories in a flash."

"Anyway, do you really think his shady memories have something to do with the one who burned down the lower quarter?" Yuri turned his attention back to Flynn, as the commandant of the Knights took out a stack of documents from under the table, "Wait, what are those things?"

"I've got Witcher to look up into several things I had in mind, including what happened during the Great War," Flynn started as he searched through the documents, "If the object Raven saw years ago was the same as the blastia we found here, I suspect that a mage from the Imperial Research Team is involved. After all, Alexei wrote in his journal that he had a mage working for the Empire take the documents regarding a blastia research. He wrote in here that he told him that he would be granted a noble status so that he would be willing to betray his research partner."

"Ya know how many of the mages workin' for the Empire right?" Raven spoke up, getting Flynn's attention, "If ya ain't got a name, yer just gonna be lookin' through a lot of people there."

Flynn gave him a nod without a change in his expression before taking out a different folder from under the documents, "Most of the mages from Alexei's time as the commandant have resigned from their positions, leaving… just one."

"Only one?" Yuri asked with uncertainty in his voice as his hand subconsciously reached out to stroke Repede's fur, "That… sounds too easy to be true…"

"It is. Though even with just one candidate to check, there is one problem I'd like to address…" Flynn was flipping through the documents in the folder he was holding before he stopped at one, turning it around for Yuri and Raven to see, "Dior Morey. He is our main suspect for now, but his whereabouts is currently unknown after his latest research was turned down from the lack of scientific details. Or rather… it was more like the details were omitted on purpose for a reason we're not aware yet."

Yuri was reading through the decent amount of letters in the document until he found one part he felt like he needed to point out, "His hometown is Aspio. Rita should know something about this guy… but why is it crossed out?"

Flynn shook his head, "I don't know. It's been like this when I first found it this afternoon," the knight closed up the folders and tidied it up on his desk, "Anyways, for now at the very least we might have a lead. We can either try to find this person in Aspio or ask Rita if she knows him. The second option, which is the hardest one, would be to find the other mages involved in the Great War."

"Alright," Yuri stood up, followed up by Repede as he rose up from lying on the floor, with Raven getting up last, "Let's just get some sleep before we all go to Aspio in case Rita doesn't know this guy."

"That would be what you and the other will do, Yuri," the dark-haired swordsman looked at his friend in confusion as he stood up as well, "I'll let Witcher find out about the other mages while I'll take Sodia and a few soldiers to investigate a site."

"Well, looks like da commandant's got his own job ta do," the oldest of the group commented before turning his attention to Yuri, "And this ol' man's too tired ta stay up longer. This ol' man will go on ahead and head ta bed, 'kay?"

Yuri let out an annoyed sigh, "Yeah, yeah. I'll be there in a bit anyway, but whatever…" he turned back to Flynn as he was heading out as well, "You too, Flynn. With everything happening at once today, you look like you're gonna pass out."

The blond knight shook his head, "Don't worry, I'll be fine. I'll head back a bit later, so you can go on ahead. I have something else to do before I go to sleep tonight."

Yuri let out another sigh, "There's no talking into you, huh? Seriously, just get some sleep already! I don't want to be the one to drag you into your bed!"

"I'm fine, Yuri," Flynn responded as he left the table, putting the documents back onto his desk, "And what about you? Karol told me that you've taken a lot more jobs than you can handle."

Yuri was left speechless as he turned towards the door without a word, opening it while whispering, "Fine."

Flynn sat down on his desk and watched as Repede left the room and his friend had closed the door for him, returning the silence into the room. The knight stared at the documents he had put on his desk just moments ago as he supported his head with his hands. Closing his eyes, he recalled the conversation he had the other day when their suspected mage had come to his office talking about nobility and his research.

' _It sounds like Yuri didn't hear his name at that time when he was here…'_  Flynn thought as he flipped through the documents once more, revealing the mage's profile to his eyes,  _'Brown hair, green eyes… but I recall him wearing a pair of_ _goggles_ _that time… and those unusual wrinkles around his left eye…'_

The blond commandant's finger found itself on the line with the mage's age, which was stated as  _unknown_.

A realization struck him,  _'A striking resemblance…!'_ he nervously flipped the document over, seeing the number  _one_  on the box for the number of family members,  _'This… I truly hope this isn't the case…'_


	9. Census Check

It was a quiet morning in the dining hall, with only the sounds of spoons and forks hitting the plates heard in the room. Rita was sitting at the corner of the table, though her eyes weren't paying attention to the food in front of her. Estelle was sitting next to her, eating quietly as she didn't know what to say when everyone at the table was being quiet.

Judith and Patty were sitting across them, both having their minds wandering into thinking different things. Karol was just eating normally, though the unusually quiet group was making his food not too appetizing for him. Raven was just being himself as he was unlucky enough that he had to settle with cake for breakfast as it was one attempt to comfort Yuri after his loss.

The problem would be the fact that Yuri was missing from the table, along with Repede and Flynn.

"U-Um…" Estelle suddenly spoke up to break the silence in the room, nervous as all pairs of eyes in the room turned to her, "Is… Yuri going to join us for breakfast?"

"I don't know…" Karol responded sadly, "When Raven and I left, Yuri was talking to Flynn. Flynn is leaving soon, so I guess… he'll come when they're done?"

"Not sure 'bout that, kid," the oldest man of the group replied as he leaned on his chair, "Ya see dat serious looks on 'em, right? I don't think it's any ol' regular talk they're havin'. They've got some complicated issues goin' on between them since last night. Pretty much like any other people with issues, he probably won't be in da mood ta eat. A grown man's mind is complicated, ya know-"

The young mage suddenly stood up and slammed the table, surprising everyone in the room especially Raven, "That's it!" the old man was looking at her in fear, feeling as if he had said something to upset the mage as usual, though she wasn't looking at him at all, "That formula works the same way as the human mind does!"

"W-What formula is it…?" Estelle asked her, still trying to recover from the fright her mage best friend had given her.

"The formula in that strange blastia that I was studying last night," Rita turned to Estelle, her eyes brimming with excitement as she grabbed the princess' shoulders, "I'm going to look over it again, okay?"

"Eh? Ah-" before she could say anything else, Rita had already dashed out of the dining hall, "you haven't… finished your breakfast…"

It was Judith's turn to get up from her seat, "If that's fine with you, should I get Yuri and Flynn to come and have breakfast? I have finished mine."

"Perhaps it's okay…" before she could respond with anything else, the Krytian had left the table with her empty plate, putting it with the rest of the dirty dishes before heading out of the dining room, "I wonder what's up with everyone all of the sudden…"

The young pirate gave her a nod, "Aye, something seems fishy since last night…"

* * *

The formula which acted like how a human mind worked… Had she heard something similar before?

Judith was walking in the hallways of the Zaphias Castle with her thoughts going anywhere but the path she was going. The memories of her childhood was vague and she was never good at remembering formulas like Rita, but the concept seemed familiar to her that she felt like she had heard about it somewhere. The dreams and nightmares she had been having for the past few days might have been trying to tell her something, but she couldn't think of anything that she should've remembered.

Perhaps… Going on whatever Rita had in mind might've lead herself to the answers she wanted, seeing as being with Yuri's group in the first place led to her doing the mission she had set herself to do with Ba'ul. She trusted the mage well enough to believe that their heroic act two years back wasn't just a nice coincidence.

"Aren't you going to get something?" the Krytian stopped in her tracks after hearing the familiar voice.

When she looked at the direction where the voice came from, it was the door leading to Flynn's room. Right, she told Estelle that she was going to get Yuri and Flynn for breakfast. She wasn't sure why she would care so much about the two young men, but it was the first thing that came to her mind when she wanted to just walk out of the room and try to recall the familiar formula Rita had mentioned.

Judith stood still in front of the door, hearing as the two childhood friends were still talking inside.

"I'm not feeling hungry right now. Go on ahead with Repede, I'll catch up with you guys later."

It was Yuri's voice, sounding less energetic than his usual tone along with being a bit muffled from the thick door and wall.

"And you were the one to tell me to take care of myself better," Flynn's tone was a bit more sarcastic than usual, though not as much as Yuri's, "Okay, but I'll be heading out as soon as I'm finished. I'll be leaving Repede to the others once I'm ready to go."

The sound of door opening made the Krytian took a step back, seeing the blond commandant stepping out of the room, "I'm guessing Yuri is being stubborn for refusing to eat?"

Flynn gave her a nod, "Yeah, and he was like that at that time when we lost Hanks' wife years ago. I still can't do anything to help him, but I'm sure he will be back to his old self sooner or later."

"I can try and talk to him," she volunteered.

"Thank you. I appreciate your help, Judith," Flynn turned to the dog beside him, "Let's go, Repede."

The commandant left the Krytian at his door, but Repede took a moment to look at her, "Don't worry. I'll try and get him to join the others soon enough."

Repede gave her the look as if he understood, even though Yuri was usually the only one who could understand him. He took another quick glance at the door before running after the commandant, who wasn't aware that the blue dog wasn't following him.

When both of them were out of her sight, Judith brought her hand to consider knocking the door, only to end up with her opening the door immediately without knocking. The long-haired swordsman, who was sitting and leaning against the windowsill, was surprised to see her when he expected Flynn to suddenly come back into his room.

"Judy?" he looked at her in confusion, though didn't bother going down from his place to greet her, "What are you doing here?"

"Oh? Is that the only thing you ask someone who wants to make sure you have something to eat for breakfast?" her tone was teasing, which brought a chuckle to the swordsman.

"Fine," Yuri got off from his spot by the window, "I'll be going there soon anyway. I need to tell the others that we're leaving soon to Aspio."

"Aspio?" she asked, but Yuri wasn't planning on giving his reasons yet as he silently headed for the door.

The Krytian soon followed him, wondering to herself if something had happened between Yuri and Flynn before. She could notice the hint of pain coming from his voice even though the swordsman was more or less being his usual self. She wouldn't be surprised if Yuri was still thinking about the people of lower quarter, knowing how worried he looked when they went missing during the time Zaphias had an unhealthy level of aer.

He wasn't trying to let it show, though, so it was best that she didn't ask any unnecessary questions.

* * *

"We're going to Aspio and that's that," it was a one-sided decision coming from the young mage as she was surrounded by a few books on her own, "I need to look into this blastia and I think I've seen a book that mentions a similar formula back in Aspio."

"I think we should see if Yuri and Judith are both in it-"

The young guild leader's words were cut off when he saw the two people he mentioned already standing by the door.

"Alright, it's settled that we're going to Aspio," Yuri was quick to agree, before he turned to Karol with a smile on his face, "Let's just say that Brave Vesperia got a job to do in Aspio. Is that alright with you, Boss?"

"Huh?" Karol turned to Judith in confusion, seeing as she didn't have any complaints either, "W-Wait, did you two take on a job without letting me know?"

"Kinda," Yuri gave him a casual reply before turning to the Krytian standing next to him, "Judy, can you get Ba'ul over here while we prepare to leave?"

Judith gave him a nod before taking out the Entelexeia's horn as she headed out from the room.

Raven was looking at Yuri, recalling the plan the three of them had the night before. It was clear to the old man that Yuri wanted to catch whoever they were who killed most of the lower quarter's population in a single night. While he wasn't part of the so-called guild job officially, he felt that he would need to watch over the young swordsman in the possible quest of revenge.

* * *

It was just a short trip by air using the old Fiertia carried by Ba'ul that the group stayed out on the ship's deck. Patty was watching their surroundings using her binoculars, with the rest of the party scattered on the deck. Karol was trying to get more information about the job from Yuri, though he wasn't planning on telling anything until they arrived. Little did the young leader notice that Raven was also aware of the facts surrounding the so-called job.

Even with Karol trying to lecture Yuri about taking shady jobs and Raven commenting how the young people should try and live their lives with extra risks to take, Repede wasn't bothered from his nap nearby. Judith was looking at the direction where the group was heading, though glancing towards Yuri's group every once and then.

The way they acted when they lost their families were similar, just like how they were both fans of battling. The only difference between their experiences would be that Yuri had his friends by his side while Judith at that time woke up in the middle of a foreign area with her only friend, Ba'ul, nowhere to be seen. She couldn't say that she understood his pain completely from that difference and she could envy his situation, even for just a bit.

* * *

Yuri, Karol, Judith, and Raven were standing in front of a building in the middle of the city of mages, prompting the young leader to question Yuri once more, "Does the job involve looking for information in the archive building?"

"Yer a bit off there, kid," the oldest of the group commented, pointing at the sign on the building's front wall, "This is da census archive building."

The look on Yuri's face became darker, "We need to find someone who has lived here."

Judith nodded in understanding, "I assume you're not going to ask Rita because it's a guild job."

There was a short pause before he gave her a nod and started walking towards the door, "Let's go."

The group entered the building to be greeted by the man behind the reception desk. Things could go well if they could gain access to the archive easily, though it wouldn't be the case seeing how none of them present were from Aspio.

"I'm terribly sorry, but the census archives are limited to residents of Aspio only," the receptionist bowed apologetically, "I'm truly sorry."

Raven had eyed the people passing by as the younger three were trying to talk into the receptionist, seeing that the people were walking around carrying tall stacks of documents. If they could get access into the archive, it would mean that they would need to look into at least that many documents. It wasn't something he liked the most, even when he was posing as Schwann to handle Alexei's dirty work in the past.

"I'm sorry, but I really can't-"

"Come on, da poor guy says no 'bout a dozen times already!" the former soldier wasn't being patient, though he looked at Yuri suspiciously when the swordsman had his attention elsewhere.

"No, we still have access to the archives," Yuri turned to the group with a sly grin on his face as he patted Karol's shoulder, "Isn't that right, Captain Karol?"

"Huh? Do we… oh…" the young leader was originally confused, until he realized what Yuri was planning, "It's a job… and I've never expected to do this for a job…"

Judith had pointed at the door on the other side of the room, which wasn't guarded despite how the archive could have important and sensitive information in them, "It seems like that door is the one we're looking for. I saw a couple of people leaving and entering that room and locking it again."

"Oh… dat's a very nice observation, my dear Judith…" Raven commented without feeling any enthusiasm, watching as the other three of the group eagerly running towards the locked door.

* * *

The pink-haired princess was sitting in the middle of the mess that was formerly Rita's main study room, petting the blue dog who had relented to having himself petted by the princess. Her eyes were looking either at the barely closed door leading to Rita's room or at Patty as she paced around the room while digging through the scattered books.

Her mind wandered into the formulas and theories that Rita had been telling her earlier, despite knowing that unlike the mage, Estelle wasn't too keen on research-related things. While they both shared a love for reading, their tastes in books made their way of thinking differ by a long margin. The thought of Flynn soon came into her mind, as he left Repede with them that morning without at least telling her where he was going.

It had been a few hours since they arrived in Aspio, but Estelle hadn't done anything to help either party with their things at all. She couldn't help Yuri because it was supposed to be strictly a guild job and she couldn't help Rita other than making sure that she ate something for lunch. Even Patty was in charge of the cooking and Repede was the one who helped the princess carry the ingredients when they went out to shop earlier.

Estelle let out a sigh as she watched the young pirate looking through a book, looking as if she knew what she was reading and was interested in continuing. It could be that she was reading Rita's book that had nothing to do with her research, though with how often she visited the mage in the past, she had never seen a single book which was meant for entertainment rather than reference.

The princess decided that she had better be walking around rather than to sit and do nothing, with Repede noticing that the petting had stopped and looked up to see Estelle walking over to a very packed bookshelf at the other side of the room. It was still quite troublesome for her with other books scattered around it, though she managed to reach it without stepping on anything other than the floor.

Scanning through the book titles written on the back of the books told her that the books in there were also reference books. She figured that she could at least pick a book for Rita to use as a reference, though she couldn't really understand what her mage friend needed anyway. She could pick a book which had the most interesting title… or the one book which looked the most worn and the oldest.

Taking it out would be another problem though, as the book was stuck in the very full shelf.

The pirate took the time took look up from the book she was reading after hearing the princess' struggle with the book, "What are you doing over there, Estelle?"

Estelle still had her hand on the book, taking a quick glance at Patty before continuing her struggles, "Ah, no, I'm just-" the book had loosened from its position on the shelf along with other books, making Estelle lose her balance as she was pulling the book with her own weight, "AH!"

Most of the books in the same shelf had fallen over along with the princess with a loud noise, which made the mage come out from her room in annoyance, "Hey, keep it down, will you-Estelle!" her annoyance went away the moment she saw the familiar pink hair popping out from the pile of books, "Estelle, what were you doing?!"

"I-I'm sorry, I was just-" she looked at her mage friend in guilt as she approached her, "I haven't done anything to help so…"

Rita let out a sigh as she helped her up, "N-No, it's fine…" the mage eyed the book Estelle was holding, reading the title as she snatched the book she was holding, "Hey, so that's where I put this book! Thanks for finding it for me!" a smile made its way to Rita's face, though it soon faded when she came eye-to-eye with her and was replaced by an embarrassed look, "I-I mean…" she let out a nervous cough as she shifted her attention back to her door, "A-Anyway, I'm going to read this book again so later!"

The mage was speaking to her with great speed and ran back into her room before Estelle could get the chance to say anything else. The princess had to admit that even with how they saw each other quite often, she couldn't hold a small laugh when seeing her flustered friend. At the very least, in the end she got to do something to help her even if it was as simple as finding a lost book.

"Entelexeia and the Philosopher's Stone…" Estelle had repeated the book's title subconsciously, "I wonder what the book is about…"

* * *

He wasn't thrilled at all.

The former knight was sitting on the ground with a pile of documents containing the records of the mages living in Aspio from the time before its destruction. He had already been through half of the stack, but it was still a long way to go and the group wasn't even stopping to get something to eat for lunch. Especially Yuri, who was the most eager of the team to dig through the documents even though the swordsman was never a fan of any kinds of document-related jobs.

If finding out the identity of the mage would make it faster for their capture, it made enough sense for Yuri to be enthusiastic in prying into census documents. Even if they couldn't bring anyone back, at least it could probably calm his mind even by a bit.

"You guys! I think I found something… or I guess someone?" Karol's voice was heard from the other side of the document shelf.

The group gathered at Karol's place as he showed them a folder containing the data of a mage, except with the name being smudged, "It looks like someone had tried to erase this person's name for some reason," Judith had taken the folder from Karol's hands as she flipped over through several documents in it, "There should be a photograph of him here if he was registered at the time before two years ago…"

"Here," Yuri casually handed her a photograph, which made her look at him in confusion, "If you're wondering where I got it, I found it in a different folder. Whoever it was who tried to pull this stupid kind of prank didn't see that they put a photo of a guy in a lady's documents."

Judith looked at the photo in surprise, losing her grip on the folder as Raven took it from her hands to read it, "Who's this… R.M. guy? Dat's definitely not our dear Rita, obviously."

"You don't even need to point that out when the gender mentioned there is obvious, old man," Yuri gave him a sarcastic comment, before noticing the surprised look on his Krytian, "What is it, Judy? You look like you've seen a ghost or something."

"Maybe," she regained her usual calm self as she let her hand holding the photo drop to her side, "I may have seen him before, but I don't remember where and when."

Karol had took the documents from Raven's hands and looked at the name closer, "I think… we can read it if we can trace the shape made from the pen's pressure when it was used to writing the name…" the young leader slowly ran his finger on the other side of the paper where the name was written, "O-I-D-R-O-M… Mordio? Wait, that's Rita's last name!"

"Wait, I thought Rita doesn't have any relatives here!" it was Yuri's turn to be surprised, "Karol, what's this guy's first name?"

"Just a sec…" the young leader continued to feel the paper's surface, "Y-E-R… I guess his name is Rey Mordio?"

"Rey… Mordio…?" there was a bit of hesitance in her voice as Judith asked herself.

"But it's not dat… what's his name again?" Raven was trying to protest, seeing that what they found wasn't exactly the one they were looking for the first place, "Dior… something?"

"Dior Morey," Yuri coldly replied, "I haven't seen his name anywhere here, so he must've burnt his documents to hide his identity. That sick bastard…!"

The young leader let out a tired sigh, "That was the last one we can find here and it's the only one without a clear name. Could it be destroyed before along with the previous Aspio?"

"I hope not," Yuri gave him a short response before walking away from the group, "All we can find is that Rita's possible relative is registered here. What an incomplete archive."

The three left behind looked at him as he left without another word before Judith spoke up, "He sounds quite depressed and disappointed."

"I second that, my dear," the older man nodded in agreement, "His hopes of findin' his family's killer had just gone poof in a matter of hours. Can't say this ol' man's surprised with dat kinda reaction though."

"A-Anyway," Karol let out a cough to gain his older companions' attention, "I guess… we can try and ask Rita if she knows this man?"

Raven responded with a shrug, "Dunno how dat's gonna do anythin', but sure I guess… This ol' man's just too hungry ta think of anythin'…"

The young leader's growling stomach was his first response, "Yeah… I'm kind of hungry too, so let's just go back to Rita's place for now…"

Raven and Karol had started leaving the room, but Judith was still frozen in her place. She took another look at the photo as she took the folder containing the man's documents with her. Flipping the personal record aside, she found several application forms for the submission of research documents. At the end of the mostly-denied submission application forms, there was another form that would've been a clue to the culprit.

The Krytian noticed that the others had left that she couldn't tell anyone about her recent discovery immediately. Even then, the man's name that Karol had figured out earlier was the name that she felt like she had heard before. There weren't that many people whose name she remembered other than her old friends and her current guildmates. Krytians only had a single word for a name because they didn't use family names. The only conclusion she could come up with was that the name came from a human she knew.

But if he wasn't a close friend or acquaintance of hers, why would she bother remembering the name of a stranger?


	10. Memory of that Name

It was just like any other cold night in Temza. The Krytian researcher had secluded himself in his study once more, leaving his 8-year-old daughter on her own. The researcher was muttering to himself as he sat on his desk while either scribbling something on a piece of paper or curling them into balls and threw them all around his study.

Hermes was too caught up in his thoughts that he didn't notice the creaking sound as Judith entered the room.

"Dad…?" her calls fell deaf on his ears as he didn't respond to her.

"I have to fix this… what I have done… I have to fix everything…" the researcher was muttering the same words over and over again, completely unaware that his daughter was already standing next to him.

She was looking at him in worry, not knowing what to do or say to comfort her father. Her hand found itself tugging at his shirt as she tried coming up with something to help him calm down, "Dad, should we get on Ba'ul for a ride?"

Her voice nearby had snapped him back to reality as he had stopped clutching his head in frustration, "Judith…" he let out a tired smile as he patted her shoulder, "Maybe later, okay? I'm still working here."

"Okay…" Judith slowly nodded, her face still filled with doubt.

She looked around the room, seeing many complicated diagrams pinned to the walls of her father's study. The drawings were fewer that she remembered when she came into his study last time. Piles of blastia parts were still there, mixed with piles of curled up paper scattered in the room. The room was a lot messier than what she had remembered.

"If I modify this… no, that would make it incompatible with…" Judith saw that her father was back to muttering things she could never understand with sounds of pencil strokes along with paper heard loudly in the room, "Or should I use this formula in-"

"Dad, what are you doing?" Judith had climbed on to Hermes lap, much to the older Krytian's surprise.

Hermes let out a tired sigh as he wrapped his arms around the smaller figure of his daughter, "I… I've made a mistake…" his grip around her tightened, "When you make mistakes, don't forget to apologize and set things right, okay?"

"Okay," Judith looked up at her father with a smile, "I promise!"

The young Krytian sat still on her father's lap as he was scribbling on a piece of paper, watching as he was working on something beyond her understanding. They weren't talking to each other, but them being together in that state was calming both of their minds. Judith was feeling her father's warmth once more after he was being distant and Hermes felt that his heart was full again with the presence of his beloved daughter.

The researcher had calmed down that he had stopped trying to tear any pieces of paper nearby compared to before. Only the sound of pencil strokes were heard in the room and the quiet atmosphere made Judith nod off in drowsiness. She  _could_  have watched her father, though she couldn't understand anything that he had been writing for the past few hours. That, and the fact that it was already past her usual bedtime.

Judith rested her head on her father's left arm as she closed her eyes, smiling in her sleep. She could feel her father's rough hand stroking her short blue hair as she was drifting off to sleep. When he had stopped doing so, she could vaguely hear him mumbling the words like 'sorry' and 'help' before she finally drifted off to slumber.

* * *

Judith's eyes fluttered open to the night wind blowing on her skin. She noticed that she had fallen asleep by the window in Rita's hut after she and the others went back from the archive building. A messy folder was still in her hands with its contents partially strewn out and almost got mixed with the other documents lying around her.

She looked around the room and saw that the party was asleep as well. Raven was lying in the middle of the room, arms and legs spread wide to cover a big space around him. Yuri was sleeping on the makeshift couch's armrest made of book stacks with Karol in the middle of the couch look-alike. Repede was curled up under the couch, ready to strike at anyone who dared to bother any of his favorite humans.

The Krytian turned to the other side of the room with Estelle and Patty sleeping in a sea of books and leaning against a nearly-empty bookshelf. Rita wasn't there with them, but the slightly-opened door to her study was telling her that she was most likely inside. The light coming from the room gave her the sign that she was still digging into her reference books. Judith walked over to the mage's study with the folders still in her hand, carefully opening the door so that she wouldn't notice the Krytian coming in.

Rita had her head on her desk with various books opened in front of her. Her eyes were closed in deep sleep while one of her hands was on top of the books' pages. Her other hand was holding the strange stone coming from the strange blastia from before. It was just her desk that was messy, but her entire study was also covered in books and documents.

The sight brought a small smile to the Krytian as it reminded her of her father's study. Notes and diagrams were pinned to the wall, books and documents cluttered on the desk and the floor, and the owner of the room sleeping on the desk. It was a nostalgic scenery.

Judith took a closer look at the sleeping mage before she took out the photo from the folder. Her eyes wandered to the goggles Rita had always worn, comparing it to the goggles worn by the man in the photo she was holding. They were both identical.

She let out a frown as she put the photo to her side as she watched Rita, "The two of you look similar. You're not related to him, are you?"

She kept her voice down as she wasn't planning on waking her up. The mage's voice echoed in her head when Yuri had asked her about the man in the photo she was holding.

" _I told you I don't have any relatives! Sure the name Mordio isn't common, but I'm sure as heck I don't know any 'Rey Mordio'!"_

' _They'd better not be related,'_  Judith thought to herself as she took out the other photo she had found in the ruins of Zaphias,  _'He is already a main suspect to destroy the lower quarter and Yuri's…'_

"Uh…" the Krytian quickly turned to the mage as she was moving in her sleep, thinking that she was waking up. The movement soon stopped as Rita was simply changing her sleeping position while muttering unknown formulas in her sleep.

The tensed-up Judith let out a chuckle as she looked at her,  _'She's a lot like you, Dad. Maybe trusting your research for her to continue it is the best decision…'_

She walked towards the door, but stood there instead of leaving as she put the photos in her hand side-by-side. On her left, possibly Rey Mordio, the father who could have killed so many people for objectives unknown to the group. On her right, a foster father who was killed along with many others and left behind his two grown non-biological sons. Herself, the strange Krytian who had lost her father… someway she couldn't recall.

The death of her father was still a mystery to her as the only thing she could remember was the other Krytians in Myorzo telling her of her father's passing. None of them told her exactly what happened and even Ba'ul was being silent when being questioned. As mysterious as his death was, it wasn't her focus at all. It had been too long ago that traces of his death would have been long gone as well. The important thing for her and the others was finding the man called Rey Mordio to be questioned.

The name seemed familiar to her and the man's appearance made her feel that she had seen him before. She couldn't remember when or where, but she knew that she had seen him before in the past.

* * *

Hermes had stopped working, seeing that his daughter was fast asleep on his arm. He didn't mind having her there with him, but his study wasn't a good place for his daughter to sleep in. His theories weren't going anywhere, but at the very least he had calmed down enough to enable him to think more rationally.

The researcher put his pencil down before carrying the sleeping figure in his arms as he walked out of the messy room. He had gone into his daughter's room, which was a bit smaller than his own study, but had a bed big enough even for her ten years later. He put her on the oversized bed, pulling the covers over her as the young Krytian slept through everything.

Hermes let out a smile as he sat on the edge of the bed, stroking his daughter's hair once more, "I'm sorry I can't be a father to you for the past few months, Judith. Your sinned father will try and fix everything so you don't have to be alone anymore. We'll go on a journey around the world with Ba'ul when everything is done, okay?"

Judith stirred in her sleep, turning to lie on her side as she faced her father.

The researcher put her bangs away from covering her face, putting them behind her ear, "You have your mother's face. Even if she's not here with us anymore, having you around feels like she lives along with us inside you."

Hermes shifted his position on the bed, looking at the small desk Judith used to study and stared at the blue flowers in a vase sitting in front of a photo frame of him and his late wife. He went over to the photo to take a closer look at it before shifting his gaze at the flowers.

"Myosotis means not to forget," he whispered to himself, "Never forget your sins and never forget the good deeds others did to you. Just like how your mother gave her life to give birth to you…"

He gently put the frame down and took another quick glance at the sleeping figure on the bed before he left the room with a smile on his face. That smile on his face soon faded as soon as he closed the door, coming face-to-face with an unwanted guest in his house.

"I'm not going to just give it up, Hermes," it was the voice of a man in a mage's robe, "If you won't continue it, should I just take over?"

"I already told you I wouldn't cooperate anymore," Hermes replied sternly, "It's not about the money and everything isn't about it. If you have done your research right, you don't have to-"

"I did, and you turned me down because you cared too much about those monsters… those Entelexeia…" the mage glared at him, "You're a Krytian, a race living life no different than us humans. Yet here you are, siding with monsters instead of your own kind?!"

"I will never approve of killing a life for the sake of research!" the researcher was raising his voice in anger, "Be it humans, Krytians, or Entelexeia alike! Can't you even consider seeing life as something precious, especially with you also having a daughter of your own?"

"Leave my daughter out of this!" the mage angrily replied, "You're just a colleague, Hermes, and you have no right to tell me what to do with my own family!"

"I don't, but as your colleague and friend, I don't want you to suffer the same pain as I did," Hermes' voice had softened, but the anger in his eyes was still present, "What would your daughter think of you when she found out that her father is a murderer…?"

The mage growled angrily as a magic circle formed below him, "Shut up!"

Hermes used his arm to shield himself from the incoming fireballs, though the magic was weak enough for him to tell that the mage wasn't trying to attack him. The mage had sped through his house, aiming for the room he wasn't supposed to be in, "Stop it! Rey!"

The mage didn't stop as he quickly rummaged through the researcher's documents, running out of the room with his hands almost full of paper and books. The researcher was going to chase him, but a different magic circle had emerged below him and sent out rock spikes to knock him back against the wall.

The door slammed open, leading to the cold wind of the night to blow into the building as Hermes clutched to his chest where the spikes had hit him. He tried calling out the mage's name a few times, but he didn't bother to look back to the house he had robbed. Angry and betrayed, Hermes yelled at the top of his lungs as he ignored his quiet surroundings.

"MORDIO!"


	11. Mordio

The next morning was a very silent morning as most members of the group were busy with their own thoughts. They had settled in Rita's small kitchen once more as they sat in the dining table for breakfast. The sound of eating utensils was the only sound they could hear as they were stuck in their own thoughts.

Yuri and Karol had just lost their possible lead, with the mage having no relation to Rita. Estelle and Patty were worried about Rita's strange look on her face the moment she stepped out of her room. Even as she had the two occasionally staring at her, the look on the young mage's face hadn't changed at all. Judith and Raven were both missing from the table and Repede was eating as if nothing happened.

Estelle would've scolded Rita if she caught the mage reading while eating, but for once she stayed silent as she saw a book sitting next to Rita. It was the same book she and Patty had found and given to her. The only time Rita had come out of her room since then would be on that morning with a look as if she had found something she shouldn't have.

Rita opened the book once more, flipping through the pages, before she rose from her seat, "Guys, I think I've figured out something about that strange blastia from before."

"What about it then?" Yuri asked, sounding not too enthusiastic.

Rita took a moment of silence as she looked at the pairs of eyes looking at her. She took a deep breath before closing the book she was holding, showing it to the others, "I read this book last night, and when I compare the formulas with the ones I found in that strange blastia… they matched up. The formulas are almost the same as the ones written in this book!"

There was another period of silence as the rest of them were looking at Rita with confused looks on their faces. Estelle was the first one to speak up, "Um… can you please explain it in a way we can all understand?"

Rita let out an annoyed sigh as she put the book down on the table, "That blastia core is actually a philosopher's stone. That's why the formulas engraved in it represent the human mind…" a frown formed on her face, "In other words… those philosopher's stones are most likely living people being turned into one… using formulas to turn their life energy into just any other energy we use when using blastia…"

"Are you saying… that the philosopher's stones are actually living people turned into stones?" Rita nodded at Karol's question, looking at the hardened looks on her companions.

Yuri, on the other hand, wasn't looking interested in the topic at all, "So, what does knowing all this has to do with finding this Rey Mordio guy? All we know is that he used to live in Aspio but Rita told us last night that she didn't know anyone named Rey or any other Mordio besides her."

The people at the table went silent once more, not knowing what to do next. Rita had gone back to her seat to eat in silence as Estelle watched her, "Rita, how about-"

"I don't know about him," Rita had sternly cut her off, knowing exactly what the princess was going to ask her, "No one in Aspio talks about my dad anyway. Even if he's the one to do it, I don't care and I'll continue to think he's just a selfish person for leaving."

"O-Okay…" Estelle looked at her friend in worry as the young mage refused to look at her when answering her question.

"The truth's sinkin' into the darkness of the ocean again, huh…" the young pirate commented, breaking the silence in the room, before her attention shifted to the two empty seats, "Wait, where's Judy and the old man?"

* * *

Judith had settled herself on the roof of a house near the entrance of Aspio, holding on to her Brionac spear as she looked at the fields outside the gates. The dreams she had were bringing back her childhood memories before the war and the mage's name was still echoing in her head. She could remember that her father had relations with the mage, remembering as he had called the mage by his last name.

The mage was named Mordio, but recalled that Rita didn't know any Rey Mordio.

At first she didn't care much about her nightmares and dreams about the past, but the recent events had prompted her to recall her childhood memories. Especially when two of her friends were most likely involved in both incidents. She felt like she had forgotten something important from the past and that forgotten thing was connected to the current events.

She looked at the mage's portrait in her free hand once more, seeing the resemblance to Rita. She couldn't remember the mage from her memories looked like, but she could remember the name clearly after what she heard from her father's yelling. If the mage had been doing something against her father's will, wouldn't it be possible for the mage to be involved in the current incident as well? Except, she remembered that their names were different.

She held on to her spear tighter as she recalled her vows with Ba'ul while holding the Brionac. Her 14-year-old self was standing on the remains of her hometown in Temza, carrying the spear she had gotten from the remains. She had vowed to fix her father's mistake as soon as possible, just before everyone noticed something wrong. She couldn't think of anything to fix it other than destroying them and that was her reason to take up the spear she held onto.

The problem would be the mistakes she had wanted to fix. Was it only the hermes blastia that she was going to destroy, or was there something else? She felt like there was something she had wanted to do with the mage in her memories, but she couldn't remember what it was. If Yuri had wanted to get revenge on this same mage, if they happened to be the same as the main suspect they had for the incident in lower quarter, then she would've needed to keep anything she remembered about him to herself first.

"I'm guessin' da sun's pretty from up there, Judith darlin'?"

The Krytian snapped herself from her thoughts as she heard a familiar voice from the ground. Still sitting on her position, she took a quick look below, giving her usual smile at the older man below, "Why it is, but it's kind of lonely watching it alone up here."

"This ol' man's not gonna make it up there, sadly," Raven replied as he looked out at the fields, "Plus da lonely sight's too gloomy for me!"

"Not if there are monsters we can fight outside."

"Not when yer dat tense, darlin'," the old man's last comment made her look down at him once more, but his eyes weren't directed at her, "If ya want a massage, come down here and this ol' man will give ya a really nice body massage!"

Judith let out a chuckle before jumping down the roof, landing a few meters away in front of him, "I'd really love a nice massage, but I'll go out and slay a few monsters for now."

"Yer wastin' a kind offer, ya know!" Raven turned around with a shrug before his tone turned serious, "Just be sure ta get some rest when yer havin' lots ta think 'bout. Makes yer head clearer ta think, ya know."

She turned her head to see Raven walking away from her. A look of surprise was on her face, feeling that the old man could sometimes offer some wisdom at times when the team needed it. Just then, his tone had told her that Raven could see through her that many things were in her mind. She could've gone back to the other and rest up like he told her, though her body preferred some exercise for the day.

* * *

The heat of the sun hardly made her tired as Judith brought down her spear into a helpless wolf monster, killing it in a single strike, making a mess of monster blood along with the other monsters she had taken down. She rushed towards the next monster, jumping and kicking the monster upwards as she slashed it with the sharp tip of the spear before rushing through it to end it.

Battling with a spear had always been a part of her for as long as she could remember. The Brionac she had was something she had surprisingly found within a lost Krytian's belongings, even though most of her kind were scholars and not fighters. The moment she had that spear in her hand, she could feel like she had been fighting with a spear for as long as she lived. She didn't really need to think about what to do in her battles as her body already knew when and where to strike.

With her body being wet from her own sweat mixed with monster blood, she kept on taking down the incoming monsters even if they didn't stand a chance against her. Battling was the best way for her to try and think things through and to remember more of her past.

* * *

"Dad!" young Judith was pulling at Hermes' sleeves as he kept busying himself on his desk, "It's time to have dinner already!"

The researcher let out a tired sigh as he put his pencil down, giving his daughter a tired smile, "I'll be there in a moment, okay? I need to organize my notes-"

"You said that an hour ago!" the younger Krytian pouted as she kept on pulling him off his desk, "Come on, the rice bowl I made for you will get cold!"

Hermes let out a tired laugh as he relented and rose from his seat, "Okay, okay…"

Judith watched as her father put several pieces of paper in a stack, but pausing for a moment before he followed her out of the study. She could try and drag him out once more, but instead of his usual focused gaze on the diagrams pinned to the wall, she saw a pained look on his face as he looked at the object hanging on the wall.

"Why can't you see how a family's love is more precious than money, Mordio? Even after you have a daughter of your own…"

Judith looked up at him, confused at the words he had whispered, "Who is Mordio, Dad?"

"A human researcher," he replied shortly as his eyes were still glued to the wall for a few seconds before he looked at her with a smile, "Come on, I want to taste what my beloved daughter cooks for me this time."

"Okay," Judith gave him a slow nod as they started walking out, but the younger Krytian had stopped after a few steps, looking back at the wall her father was so intent on looking at.

A pair of goggles were hanging on the wall, but she had never seen her father wear them. Not in any situation she remembered.

The color and the style of the goggles felt familiar to her.

* * *

' _A pair of goggles…?'_  Judith had stopped in the middle of the fight, recalling the familiar goggles as she had seen the same somewhere that day.

A plant monster suddenly jumped and tried attacking from behind as she lost focus for a few moments. The Krytian noticed the incoming attack, sending out a ball of concentrated wind from her spear to send the monster away from her. She jumped back from the crowd of monsters which had already surrounded her before she brought her spear down, smashing the ground hard enough to cause rocks to be sent flying towards the monsters.

She took a deep breath to calm herself down after the excitement of the fight before thinking back to the familiar goggles and the image of her mage friend popped up in her mind, wearing the same goggles she saw in her father's study,  _'It can't be…'_

She looked up in surprise, not believing in the conclusion she had in her mind. Though as she did so, her eyes caught something else disturbing from far away.

Black smoke was rising from the other side of the hills. When she recalled the position she was in during the fight, there was only one city located near the rising smoke. It was Halure.

"Judy!" the Krytian turned in response to her name being called, with her friends running towards her in a hurry, "We need to get to Halure and fast! Can you get Ba'ul here quickly?"

The expression on her face turned serious as she nodded at Yuri, "I'll call him."

She put Ba'ul's horn to her ear to contact her Entelexeia friend, but as soon as her gaze fell to the mage in the group, her expression had softened. If her fears were true, then she had to do her best to keep it from her, only until she knew what she should say to her friend.


	12. Memories of Fire and Blood

"This… this is horrible!" the pink-haired commented as she looked at burning buildings as soon as the party landed at the entrance of Halure.

The thick smoke was limiting their vision as well, though they could slowly make out the figure of an Imperial Knight and a person nearby as they approached them. The first thing he would want to ask would be what the Knight was doing that the fire could happen in the town, though the person's pleading cries in front of the Knight had stopped him.

"Please… please! You have to save my children! They are the only family I have left!"

"Please calm down, Ma'am. Our Knights will do what we can to help everyone in this town! Commandant Flynn is also on his way here!"

The ear-piercing cries of the woman had shifted Judith's attention to the thick smoke covering the area near the tree. She had to save the woman's children no matter what, even if she couldn't see very well in the thick smoke in front of her. She felt the need to save them.

Without any words, the Krytian had dashed through the thick smoke covering the area, ignoring the calls of her friends and guildmates. Her Brionac was ready at her side to fight whoever had caused the disaster in the peaceful town. She had blindly charged through the thick smoke, only stopping once she heard the sound of children crying.

She looked around to find the source of the voice, leading her to the root of the tree with a pair of crying children looking up in fear at a cloaked person standing in front of them. The cloak mages usually wore was visible clear enough for her despite the thick smoke. She became more certain that the mage standing between her and the children was the one they had been looking for when she saw the mage holding up a blastia-like object with its core looking almost the same as the philosopher's stone Rita had showed them before.

Judith had run towards them, knocking the strange blastia off his hand before he could do whatever he wanted to do with the children. The mage stepped back from the sudden attack, though he had cautiously covered his face with the hood he had on the cloak. She pointed her spear at him, though the mage didn't show himself to be stunned at the sight of the weapon in front of him.

"Who are you?" Judith sternly asked as she kept her Brionac pointed at him.

The mage didn't say a word, which prompted Judith to try and charge at him. She had aimed her spear at the mage's hood instead, trying to unmask the mage's identity. The mage was surprised at the unexpected aim as he tried dodging the stab, though the fabric of his hood had caught itself on the edge of Judith's spear that it allowed her to get a glimpse of his hair color.

Judith's eyes grew wide from the slight reveal,  _'Brown hair…?'_

The mage ripped a bit of his hood to release himself from the spear before a magic circle appeared in front of him. The unexpecting Krytian couldn't dodge in time as stone spikes came out of the circle, hitting her directly and sent her a few meters away from him. A different magic circle appeared in front of him once more, sending a big ball of fire which had knocked her unconscious to the end of the raised ground.

A few magic circles appeared next, ready for another set of attacks, though he was stopped in time when Repede had showed up from behind Judith, spinning his body as he knocked the mage away. The sound of footsteps were heard from behind the Krytian as her friends had come to her side to help, though the mage were walking farther from them.

He clicked his tongue in irritation, "Damn you lower quarter trash!"

"Hey! Wait!" Yuri called out angrily from getting the unpleasant nickname as he ran over to the mage, though he had already gone through the shrubs behind him and out of their sights, "He got away…!"

"Judith!" the pink-haired princess had run over to the unconscious Krytian.

"You guys get her to the inn," Yuri spoke up as he walked back to the group, "I'm going to wait for Flynn to get here."

* * *

Flames were burning everywhere. The bodies of the fallen Knights were scattered in the way, though there weren't any visible injuries on their body. The world was rocking around her as she felt warmth around her body, though the warmth didn't come from any kind of fire around her. Her head was pounding hard, but she couldn't really recall what had happened before.

The sound of panting came from above her. She looked up and she saw the familiar face she had always cared for bathed in sweat.

"D-Dad…?" the barely-conscious Judith called out in a weak whisper, which prompted her father to stop running.

"Judith…?" the look of disbelief was on his face before it was replaced by a relieved smile as he brought her into a hug, "Thank goodness you're alright…"

She had a confused look on her dirt-stained face as she looked up at her father, "Dad… what… happened…?"

The smile faded from his face as he looked up at the crater behind them, bright from the flames below with gigantic monsters flying around, "I'm sorry…"

Judith looked at her father, getting even more confused as he had put her down and released his arms from her smaller figure, "Why are you saying sorry, Dad?"

"I did something I wasn't supposed to do," he spoke up with a sad smile, "I'll have to leave and try to atone for my sins, so you have to stay strong and live your life," her father crouched down in front of her, putting his big hands on her shoulders, "You don't have to forgive your foolish father. Don't become like me, Judith."

"Hermes! There you are!" a Knight had run over to her father's side, "Captain Alexei is waiting for you!"

There was a pained look on his face as he nodded, "I understand…" he looked back at his daughter, holding her face gently in his hands, "Don't forget your promise from before, okay?"

"Ah! Dad!" he looked at her sadly as the Knight took him away from her.

Judith looked on at the direction where the Knight had taken her father, not knowing exactly what had happened to him. Her father had never mentioned what mistake he had done and why the monsters looking like bigger versions of Ba'ul were flying around the mountain. She didn't know anything and she didn't know what to do in the middle of the battlefield.

She looked around and she couldn't find any other Krytians other than herself. Ba'ul wasn't responding to her calls either. She was alone, both physically and in her mind.

An explosion had surprised her as the giant ball of flames had appeared at the other side of the crater. A giant monster had fallen down into the crater, completely motionless, after the explosion earlier had taken its life. Her shaky legs managed to take her to the edge of the crater to see the fallen monster clearly, though another explosion nearby had knocked her back and away from the crater.

Her body had hit the deformed stone spikes behind her, with some of the sharper spikes left scratches on her arm. The powerful impact was making her body feeling all pain as her eyes started to get blurry, until the sight of a person, who wasn't dressed like a Knight, ran in front of her, though the passing flying monster had knocked him off his footing and towards the crater.

Seeing that the person was the only one living she had seen so far after parting with her father, she forced herself to run over to the crater to reach for the person's hand. She could grab him before he fell, but the weight was far too much for her small figure to handle. Her hand was already hurting as she clutched onto the rocks at the edge of the crater to keep herself and the person she was helping from falling.

She tried pulling the person up, unintentionally looking up at the sky as she did so. There was the sight of a familiar flying creature far off, who wasn't doing anything hostile instead of the other monster looking alike around the battlefield. She couldn't yell loud enough for her voice to reach him, but she could try calling the creature's name in her mind.

' _Ba'ul!'_  she thought, hoping for any movement in response as she looked up at it desperately,  _'Please help!'_

The creature moved, slowly flying towards her, but only stayed flying in front of her and the person. The creature's eyes were looking at her both in worry and fear.

"Help us, Ba'ul!" her grip on the rocks was starting to slip, "I… I can't… hold on any longer…!"

Ba'ul flew lower to the person's feet level, allowing for her and the person to land on his back. They had made it safely on Ba'ul's back as he flew back to the top of the crater. The person they had just saved kept silent until the moment when Ba'ul was flying close enough to the group, as the person quickly jumped off without another world.

Judith was too dizzy to think about what to do with the person she had just saved, though with Ba'ul she could do something else.

"Ba'ul, let's go and find my dad!" her voice was louder than her usual one as it was almost drowned in the sounds of explosions and roaring monsters.

Ba'ul let out a cry to let her know that he understood before he went higher up in the sky. The view of the battlefield from the sky wasn't as clear and disturbing as she saw on land as the only things she could see were the lights coming from explosions. The view continued to be like that until Ba'ul began to fly lower and lower.

Their flight came to a stop near a small hill of rock from the side Judith had landed, though as she approached it, the hill turned out to be a small and narrow cave with two people in the area. One, who looked like the person she had saved from falling into the crater, was standing above the second person, who was the person she had been looking for.

"Dad!"

Her father didn't notice the incoming young Krytian as his gaze was directed at the person in front of him. The person with the Imperial Mage Cloak.

"You took everything from me! If you had given me your research in the first place, this war wouldn't have happened!"

"I will either way," Hermes replied sternly, "I've seen your latest research and that's the main reason why I can't entrust you with mine!"

"Shut up!" the mage aimed his glowing palm at him, "I  _will_  be the one to see Captain Alexei and I  _will_  be the one to take the credit for our research!"

"The credits don't matter anymore!" the researcher was yelling back at the mage, "I have my reasons for doing what I did and I will take the blame for everything!"

"It does matter… to ME!" the mage had formed a magic circle in front of his palm, but before he could fire off any magic at the Krytian, he had got an unexpected guest coming at him.

"Stay away from my dad!" Judith had jumped towards the mage, clinging to his side as he tried focusing on his magic.

"J-Judith…!" he looked at his daughter in disbelief before he frantically searched the area around him to keep the mage away from the young Krytian. His hand had touched the hilt of an abandoned sword, which was sitting next to him. He took the sword firmly in his hands as he stood up, "Do not harm my daughter!"

The mage had finally managed to grab Judith by the collar before he threw her to the side of the mouth of the small cave, though he didn't notice the incoming attack. Hermes had brought the sword down, creating a deep gash across the mage's left eye.

"GAAAHHH!" he covered his bleeding eye as he glared at Hermes, "You…! How dare you…!"

The Krytian had braced himself for an attack, despite not knowing how to fight with a sword. He paid attention to the mage's gaze and noticed that his rage wasn't directed at him. He followed his line of sight, spotting his weakened daughter starting to regain conscious by the cave.

"I will take… your most precious…!" the mage had brought his glowing palm down to Judith's direction, but Hermes had caught up to him and shielded her with his own body.

Judith's vision was still blurry as her consciousness was slowly returning, but the voice in her head kept telling her to run away and get to safety. She ignored it from the headache she had until she looked up.

Judith froze in place as she saw the silhouette of her father towering above her, before some red liquid splashed onto her face. The sword her father was holding fell to the ground with a clanging sound before the big body of her father followed suit with a loud thud. What was left in front of her was the sight of a one-eyed mage with brown hair covered under his hood with a red dagger-like object coming out of his palm.

"D-Dad…" the young Krytian was left speechless as warm tears started falling from her eyes.

She was afraid of the mage. She was mad at the mage. She saved the mage, but the mage had hurt her father. Her only living family.

A hand had made its way to Judith's face, making her look down at her dying father. He was looking at her with a weak smile as she held her father's cold hand in both of hers. His body glowed while he looked at her with his soulless eyes as his life was slipping away. His bloody lips were moving, saying things to her like nothing bad had ever happened to him.

His body disappeared into small balls of light being drained away by an unknown force to her, but his last words echoed in her head as she let out the ear-piercing scream she had never done alongside Ba'ul's angry growls.

" _Don't cry, Judy. Your pretty smile reminds me of your mother who had given you life."_


	13. Doubts and Discoveries

Judith sat up with a loud gasp as cold sweat was dripping from her face. She looked at the area around her, which was starting to get darker from the setting sun visible through the window on her left. The sky was changing its color from orange to dark blue of the night, bathing the room she was in with darkness.

"It's about time that you're up."

The Krytian turned to the source of the familiar voice, finding Rita and Patty sitting by the table at the other side of the room.

"Estelle was worried, you know," the mage's tone was worried as well as she tapped her fingers on the table, "J-Just so you know, I'm not that worried, okay?"

"Okay," Judith gave her a smile as she spoke up with a teasing tone, before the teasing turned into a softer tone, "Thank you, Rita."

"W-W-What are you thanking me for?!" the mage's cheeks went red as she stammered on her own words before she pushed herself up from her seat, "A-Anyway, I'm going to let Estelle know that you're already awake before meeting up with Yuri and Flynn!"

The Krytian chuckled as the mage ran out of the room in embarrassment, "How cute."

"Are you feeling okay now, Judy?" Judith turned to the blonde pirate in response, "Do you need anything?"

"No," she shook her head as she smiled, "I'm fine now, Patty."

The Krytian shoved the covers off her as she got off from her bed. She looked out through the window, seeing the pink-haired princess busying herself with taking care of the injured. The brunette mage had left her shortly as the Krytian could see her running to the direction of the entrance where the mayor's house should've been. The fire and its aftereffects had been taken care of, but the trauma of the incident was still written on the victims' faces.

It was the mage from before, without a doubt. She slowly recalled her encounter with the mage as he cornered a couple of helpless kids. The light coming from the blastia-like object made her recognize the object's existence in the mage's hand. It was the same light as the one she had burned into her memories the moment she saw her father being killed.

She remembered the brown hair from the mage she encountered and the mage she saw in her memories. The mage was the same person as the one who took her father's life. Much to her dismay, the mage also shared a lot of similarities to one of her friends.

It was upsetting to her, knowing that even if her father had done something wrong, his death was something that he didn't deserve. At first she had wanted to remember her past to help her friend on his troubles, but she didn't want them anymore. She remembered the pain of her past and she immediately regretted it. It was best that she never knew anything from the start.

As the Krytian had subconsciously grabbed the wooden windowsill of the room, the sound of footsteps came closer to her as the pirate had joined her by the window. She noticed that her strength had caused the windowsill to be slightly cracked, prompting her to let it go immediately. She looked at Patty as she stood next to her while looking through the window quietly. Looking at her, Judith remembered that Patty had also been through an amnesiac moment in their journey before she found out who she truly was.

Judith had felt the emotional pain she felt as a child when she remembered the past. It started making her wonder if her pirate friend actually experienced the same pain when she regained her memories.

"Patty? Can I ask you a question?"

"Fire away, Judy."

"How did you feel when your memories returned?" Patty shot her a questioning look, not expecting that kind of question coming from the Krytian, "Did you regret remembering about who you really are?"

"Not really," the pirate shook her head after a moment of silence before she turned her gaze towards the town outside, "As dark as the stormy seas my memories are, I wouldn't know who I fought for if I didn't remember who I was. I don't regret it, because everyone was there for me. Because Seifer was there for me…"

"Because everyone was there…" Judith whispered to herself as she held her hands close to her chest, "Even if your existence in the past is the cause of the deaths in the present…?"

"It's because of Alexei…" Patty had heard the Krytian's whispers, responding to her with a frown, "I couldn't do anything about Alexei caused to my crew… that's why Seifer had to…"

"I see…"

Their situation was different from each other. Alexei was involved in Patty's case, but for her own case, she was the only one involved. She had the chance to prevent the present deaths from happening, but she had chosen a single life over many innocent lives. It wasn't something that could be tolerated just because she didn't know anything. She had to fix it herself and leave her friends out of it, because it was entirely her own fault.

" _I have to fix everything!"_

Her father's tired voice from her past echoed in her head. He had tried fixing everything, but the thing she could find out about her father's mistake was the creation of Hermes blastia. Was the mage part of her father's mistakes too? Was that the mission she had forgotten and that she had to fix too? She remembered that she had promised to fix her mistakes, though she couldn't think of a proper way to fix a living being.

She could rely on Ba'ul's abilities to sense the abnormalities of aer in order for her to destroy the Hermes blastia her father had created. She couldn't do the same to fix a person and the other option she could come up with wasn't the path she had planned to take herself. She could kill monsters easily, but she couldn't take a human life just as easily.

No, it wasn't the time to think that way for the time being. She wasn't fully certain about one fact concerning the mage and his possible connection to one of her friends. The resemblance of their appearances were similar, but the difference in personality was making her doubt the connection. Her only task for now would be to help in trying to find the mage for questioning rather than jumping to conclusions.

She would have to finish her friends' matters first before taking care of hers. She had her doubts, but it was her decision after recalling the memories she would rather not remember at all.

* * *

"I don't know what he really wants!"

Halure's mayor had slammed the table in frustration, surrounded by his burned belongings in his house, "That man came and started creating chaos here for no apparent reason!"

"I-I see…" the blond knight was taken aback by the older man's sudden outburst as he sat across him, though his dark-haired friend sitting next to him didn't look too surprised.

If anything, Yuri looked like he could run out of the building and cut down the mage without warning. He wasn't going to let his foster family's killer on the loose for what he had done.

The swordsman let out an irritated sigh as he leaned back in his seat, making a sudden movement which had woken up Repede on his feet, "This isn't going anywhere…"

"I know," Flynn responded with a pained look on his face, "But we need to know what he's planning so we can easily track him down. There should be a reason for him to attack Halure without any provocation…"

"If that's the case…" the two turned back to the mayor as he started once more, "I believe he demanded me to show him the houses of the survivors in Halure from the time when monsters attacked two years ago, exactly at the time when the barrier fell. He wasn't too happy when I refused him out of respect for the families' privacy."

"And that small thing sparked that maniac?" Yuri had blurted out bluntly as he asked, "That's more than just no apparent reason to attack then."

"I-I wasn't expecting this incident to happen shortly after, but-"

The house's door slammed open to reveal the brunette mage, "Guys! I found something else from the blastia!"

"You're still on that thing?" the swordsman commented with an uninterested look on his face before Rita had slammed her hands on the table, "H-Hey!"

"Please tell us what you've found out, Rita."

The brunette mage gave him a nod before she put the blastia from before on the table, "Here," she pointed at the core, which had black opaque gem in it instead of the previously red clear gem, "I was holding on to this when I put the fire out with my magic and the gem had changed colors when I checked it just now."

Rita took the gem out, showing the three that the gem still had small spots of its original color.

"The formula is still in this philosopher's stone, but the energy contained in this is not as strong as the last time I checked it. In other words…"

There was hesitance in her voice, which had Yuri curious, "In other words…?"

"The stone needs more human lives… just to be able to produce more energy…"

"Then the reason for the attack earlier…" Flynn looked at her in realization, "Could it be… he was trying to find more victims to be turned into those stones…?"

The mage gave him a hesitant nod, "Yeah, I guess that's why-"

"Wait," Yuri had cut her off with a question of his own in mind, "If he's only looking for people to kill, why did he need to find specific people like the victims from two years ago?"

"I have a theory about that. I think different people will produce more energy when turned into a philosopher's stone and people who've experienced some kind of trauma make more energy. I haven't found anything about how people's energy are measured, but I can only say that given the correct formulas, the stones can do anything from changing shapes to resurrecting the dead…"

"I see…" the mayor nodded in understanding, "I'm afraid I can't do anything else to help you all. All I could recall was the report of people missing in the chaos, but the guards didn't mention anyone leaving the town other than the mage himself."

"This should be sufficient clues for now," the blond knight stood up before giving the mayor a bow, "Thank you for your cooperation. I shall have a few Knights here stationed to help with the rebuilding of the town."

"Well, I guess I'm heading back-"

"Yuri, Rita, please wait," when the swordsman and the mage turned to him, Flynn had offered them a small piece of paper, "This is the location of the settlement my brigade and I investigated since yesterday. I'm not sure if any of you can find anything there, but what happened there was quite similar to the case with Halure."

"Why are you giving it to us?" Yuri took the paper as he questioned his friend, "You could've come along with us and lead the way."

Flynn shook his head, "That, I cannot do," he turned his head to the mayor, "I've promised the mayor to help with the rebuilding and I need to go back to Zaphias tomorrow for Witcher's report."

Yuri gave him an irritated sigh, "This is why I told you to share some of your workload to the other Knights. It's better than seeing them standing out doing nothing like idiots."

"Please stop calling my Knights with names!"

"Hey, are you guys done yet?!" the two friends turned to the angry mage as she tapped her foot in irritation, "We've got what we needed here, right? I'm going back to the inn and read more about those philosopher's stones."

"Yeah, sure," Yuri gave her a shrug, which she couldn't see as Rita had already headed for the door, "Just be careful that the victim of that philosopher's stone doesn't come and haunt you."

"S-Shut up! G-Ghosts don't exist and they're not scientifically proven!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feel free to leave kudos and comments to let me know what you guys think so far!


	14. Disclosure

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got hit by a writer's block while working on this chapter, but I hope it's satisfactory enough. Leave a comment to tell me what you guys think!

Judith found herself awake in the middle of the night once more. Her memories of the past had returned, but what she remembered was something she had never wanted. She didn't want to remember how her father was taken from her right in front of her. That, and how the mage resembled the murderous mage she and her friends were after.

She went out of the room where she and the girls were staying, quietly so that she wouldn't wake anyone. The sound of her heels echoed in the empty lobby of the inn as she headed for the door. She would need to head out to get some fresh air while trying to talk to Ba'ul about how much he knew of her forgotten past, but she wasn't alone outside.

From the stairs leading to the inn, she could see Yuri and Repede sitting by the fountain. Her dark-haired friend and his canine companion were the only ones there, as the residents had retreated to their own homes to rest. The quietness of the small town at night would make any slight sounds louder that they usually would.

The sound of the Krytian going down the stairs had caught the attention of Repede while Yuri kept his gaze directed at the night sky. Having similar traits and interest in battles, their senses in another presence nearby were sharp enough. It was enough for her to tell that Yuri had noticed her coming his way.

"Going for a walk this late?" the swordsman asked her, though he didn't bother looking at her as he leaned back on the fountain's wall.

Judith responded with a nod, "Yes. And I thought you're not one to enjoy counting the stars in the sky."

"I'm enjoying it just fine," Yuri folded his arms as he grinned, "I'm almost out of stars to count already."  
"Care to tell me how many are there?"

"More than one, that's for sure. I know that Brave Vesperia is one of them."

"Thanks."

Yuri raised an eyebrow at the Krytian as she took the empty spot next to him, "What for? Counting the stars?"

"For telling Patty and Rita to watch over me before. I heard it from Estelle," Judith let out a teasing smile, "I don't mind having them watch over me, but you could've been a better gentleman if you were the one to watch over me."

"By going into the girls' room and risk having Rita shoot fireballs at me?" the swordsman scoffed in response, "No thanks."

"That's true," she let out a chuckle, "I guess she was just trying to look after us in her own way."

"Whatever her reason is, I just don't want to end up like the old man," Yuri turned to the Krytian sitting next to him, "I'm guessing you still have those sleeping troubles again, huh?"

Judith didn't give him an answer. She knew that either Raven or Yuri would be the first ones to find out about her sleeping troubles. She was never good at lying and even if she did lie, Yuri would've easily seen through her. There was no point for her to hide anything anymore.

"I might have seen that person… that mage from before," Judith started as Yuri kept silent with an unchanged expression, "I'm starting to remember my past during the Great War and the mage was there. It's keeping me awake for most nights."

"I've figured as much when you suddenly ran to him when we made it here," the swordsman let out a sigh as he turned his gaze away from her, "Even if you're the one to always mercilessly charge at the enemy first, you never did it carelessly like that."

"Are you saying that I'm always that brutal? That's horrible, you know."

Hearing the Krytian's hurt tone only made Yuri laugh instead, "Nice try on being a delicate woman, Judy," he rose back to his feet, "At least you're back to yourself. It won't do us any good if you keep losing sleep, especially for tomorrow."

Judith responded with a nod, "We're going to the same place as when I helped Lucina's father before. I guess Ba'ul and Repede were right when they noticed something unusual there."

Repede let out a bark as he and Yuri stood in front of her, "I guess that's going to make it easier to find. I'm counting on you and Ba'ul for tomorrow."

"Yes," Judith's eyes never left the swordsman as he and Repede walked away.

She had never asked why he was there in the first place. From his expression before, she could guess that he was still thinking about his lower quarter family whom he had lost. Knowing him from traveling together and being in the same guild for two years, she had expected that kind of reaction coming from him. She had been there herself as well when she woke up in Myorzo for the first time, except that she woke up being surrounded by strangers, without her father or Ba'ul being there for her.

That was when confusion struck her. Did Yuri purposely had Rita and Patty to be there in case she woke up? She had never told anyone other than Rita about her father and she hadn't told anyone her story that she had started remembering. If Yuri never knew about them, then why did he do what he did? While she knew he cared for his friends almost like his other family, she wasn't expecting him to care on an emotional level. Especially not to her.

It wasn't like him at all, but she felt happy for the unusual attention.

Her happiness couldn't last long as she recalled how the mage she had saved was most likely the one to burn down the lower quarter. If she hadn't saved him then, he wouldn't take Yuri's lower quarter family from him. But she couldn't tell him the truth, not when he was being nicer than usual to her. She couldn't really understand why, but she didn't want to upset him in any case.

She could've tried to find out the identity of the mage now that she had remembered, until she noticed the similarity of the wanted mage's name with the name of the mage from the documents.

"Dior Morey… Rey… Mordio…?"

* * *

The party of eight had landed in the deserted settlement, which was the same as Judith had left previously. Aside from the fresh footprints of the knights from Flynn's investigation, the tents and the area looked the same.

The group had only taken a few steps inside when Repede suddenly started growling as he looked at the empty air in front of them, which had confused Yuri, "What is it, Repede?"

The dog didn't look back as he sped into the settlement, prompting the others to follow him into an abandoned building made of rocks. Repede was pacing back and forth in front of the building's broken door, looking more anxious than usual. Yuri had to kneel down to the canine's level to try and calm him down, but Repede's whining was more than he could usually handle.

"Something's not right here," the swordsman commented as he put a comforting hand on Repede's back, "Repede isn't usually like this at all."

Judith nodded in agreement, "Ba'ul told me that he sensed something strange coming from this building. It doesn't have anything to do with aer, but he felt similar energy coming from inside."

"What are waiting for, mateys?" Patty asked as she looked at the group, "It's time for us to get in for some treasure hunting inside!"

"You're joking, right? That building doesn't look like it's been used for years!" Rita's statement had caught the attention of the group, but a certain old man's smirk was the one thing she had noticed right away from the group, "W-What's with that look, old man?!"

"Yer afraid of ghosts poppin' out here and there, Rita darlin'? Ya seem ta be outta yer-"

"I-I'm not scared, you stupid old man!" the mage yelled in response before she took the lead as she kicked the broken door open, "T-There's… there's no g-ghost here! Nothing!"

"We never mentioned anything about finding ghosts here."

"S-Shut up, you!" Rita's yelling was heard echoing from the inside in response to the Krytian's statement.

The group entered the old building, which was only filled with old furniture and items belonging to a usual building. The group spread out through the building's rooms while trying to find something looking out of place, though the search didn't result anything significant. Everything in the building's rooms was normal, until Repede suddenly growled at Karol.

"Uh… Yuri…?" the swordsman turned around to see the young leader staring at his growling canine friend, "Can you tell why Repede looks at me like he's going to bite me?"

Yuri looked over at Repede, before he traced his canine friend's gaze to be directed at the old bookshelf behind Karol, "Nope, Repede isn't trying to bite his own guild leader in this case. I think he smells something unusual coming from that shelf…"

"The shelf…?" Karol turned around to face the old bookshelf behind him.

He scanned the packed shelf, which was filled with old books covered in dust with some cobwebs decorating the small gaps above the books on each level. The hardcovers of the books would start peeling off the moment Karol tried taking any of them out, separating the cover from the contents of the book. The young leader panicked from the books he had ruined from his curiosity, while Yuri looked on as if nothing big happened.

"Estelle's not going to be happy to see that, Boss," the swordsman commented casually before he pulled out the cover left behind in the shelf, "Well, I guess whoever the owner of this house isn't going to be happy if they come back here. Assuming they're alive, that is."

"Y-Yeah…" Karol nervously took the cover from Yuri's hand as he attempted to fix it, though his and Yuri's attention was switching around between the ruined book and Repede's strange behavior.

Yuri had ignored his leader's efforts on the book as he directed his attention fully at the shelf. His lack of interest in books was preventing himself from seeing the different book on the shelf in the first place. He could at least tell that the shelf and the books were old from their appearance, save for the one sitting near the top level of the shelf. He would think that whoever to decide that hiding an extra book there wasn't clever enough to see how the clean-looking book stood out from the other books.

He tried taking the book out from the shelf, "This one doesn't look-"

There was a clicking sound as Yuri had pulled the book halfway out, before the shelf moved to the side with a loud rumbling sound coming from behind it. A human-sized hole on the wall revealed itself along with stairs leading down, surprising the two in the room. Whirring sound could be heard echoing from the hole, which prompted Repede to start barking violently.

"That's a hidden door!" Karol exclaimed as he tried peeking to the end of the stairs, but the hidden passage was too dark for him to see clearly, "I can't see anything…"

"You don't have to look down there if we're going to go there ourselves," Yuri knelt beside Repede as he put his hand on the canine's back once more, "I don't like how this place is affecting Repede like this, but we don't have a choice," he turned back to the young leader with a serious look on his face, "Let's go get the others."

The young leader hesitated at first before he gave him a nod, "Y-Yeah!"

* * *

"W-What is this place?!"

The group looked around at the gigantic room filled with foreign machines surrounding them. The machines were running while making loud noises, though they didn't know what they were for. The vibrating and moving metal objects were the only ones they could see, until they walked further in to find a line of people dressed in dirty and torn clothes.

"There are people in here!" Estelle was the first one to notice as she pointed at them, "Let's try and ask them about this place!"

"Whoa, whoa! What's da rush, our dearest princess?" the old man called out to the running pink-haired princess, who stopped as she heard the barely-audible call, "I don't think dat's a good idea if ya look closer…"

"What's this?!" Patty was looking through her binoculars in surprise, "The machines are swallowing the people like a whale having supper!"

"N-No way!" the attention of the group turned to Rita as she stood farther back from the group, staring at the red gems coming out of the other end of the machine, "T-That's… the philosopher's…!"

"Then… are these machines…" Judith looked at the machine as she saw another person being led into the machine by the conveyor belt and coming out as another red gem, "… turning people into those gems…?"

"I… I think…"

"That's…!" Yuri's loud voice had interrupted Rita before the swordsman suddenly took off from the group, "People from the lower quarter!"

"Yuri! Wait!" Karol's call had fallen on deaf ears as his voice was drowned from the loud machines.

"This is horrible!" Estelle commented as she went back to the group, "There are people from the lower quarter and I recognized a few from Halure as well. We need to save everyone!"

The young leader nodded in agreement, "Yeah. I know that our job is supposed to find out about the mage's location, but… I don't want anyone here to be victims either!"

* * *

"Damn!" Yuri had dashed for the machines, looking for any familiar faces being led into the machines, only to have the last people being turned into the philosopher's stones, "I… I didn't make it in time!"

The swordsman had slammed his fist at one of the machines in anger while Repede stood by his side, sharing the pain his human friend was having. Yuri wasn't going to let the mage get away with what he did to the people of the lower quarter, no matter who he actually was. He was going to pay for the precious lives he had taken and it would be with his life.

"Are you enjoying yourself with destroying other people's precious creations?"

"So you finally showed up," Yuri recognized the voice from their previous encounter and unsheathed his sword before turning to the mage with a glare, "The murderous mage, Dior Morey!"

"I'm only using their pathetic lives to save the lives of nobles who truly deserve them," the mage gave him a shrug as he looked at him with his only green eye visible through the goggles he wore, "The lower class should stay as trash as I deserve to stand above them."

Yuri wasn't going to hear any of the mage's nonsense anymore as he charged in with his sword ready to strike him down. The mage had shot fireballs strong enough to knock his sword away from hitting him, before sending rock spikes at his direction. The spikes weren't hard to avoid as Yuri stepped back, only to be wrapped by vines coming out from below him.

The mage had let his guard down as Repede had already run behind him to attack with spirals of light and sent the mage airborne with him. He ended the attack with a slash on his shoulder as he dove down, though not before he sent out burning projectiles at the mage. They both landed on the ground, though with the mage clutching his injured shoulder before he raised the canine in rings of light.

"Repede!" Yuri called out to the hovering dog as he tried breaking free from the vines binding him, but the vines were too sturdy for his own strength to break as he couldn't swing his sword freely.

Just as Repede was about to be dropped down from the spell, a blur of blue and white had quickly dashed into the battlefield to catch him before giving the mage an overhead kick and landing in front of Yuri. The attack had caused the mage's hood to be dropped to the back to reveal his brown hair, but another attack had come for him before his face could be clearly seen.

A ball had hit him on the back of his head, knocking him hard on the ground, before a spinning ball of fire landed on his back. The fire disappeared before the second ally jumped off the mage's back to join the others.

"Karol! Judy!"

"It looks like someone's in a tight situation," Judith playfully commented as she walked over to his side, using her spear's sharp edges to cut through the vines.

"Thanks for the help," the swordsman took a quick glance at the Krytian before turning back to the mage as he got up, "Now's the time for the reveal for this mage's true identity."

Karol looked back in both surprise and confusion, "W-What do you mean?"

"I guess I'm not the only one who knows about his name," the Krytian responded as she looked at the mage, whose goggles were broken from the hits, "Dior Morey… or perhaps… Rey Mordio?"

"Huh…" the mage looked up with a smirk on his face, revealing the red gem replacing his left eye, "Looks like the daughter has inherited some of the father's brains after all. It's not just the hair color after all… Hermes' daughter?"

Yuri and Karol looked at their companion in shock whileJudith's grip on her spear tightened as she felt the pain over hearing her father's name in a less pleasant situation, "I… remember you…"

"There's no need," a magic circle had appeared on Rey's feet, "As I shall kill off Hermes' remaining family with the rest of her friends along with my secret factory! This is for the lowly filth who trespasses!"

The ground shook as Rey charged his magic around him, getting the three people down to their knees, "So… you're trying to get away from your crimes with a mass suicide and destroying your dirty work?!"

"Hah!" the mage scoffed as the magic circle below him slowly grew in size, "I have the ultimate philosopher's stone to heal me! The stones are too strong to be broken with a simple explosion!"

"T-This magic… is too strong…!" Karol commented as he slowly brought his head up to look at Rey's red gem eye, "That stone… whose soul was it… that makes his magic so strong…?"

The mage had stopped casting as he let out a smirk while glancing at Judith, "Someone you might have known, perhaps? This is just my revenge for preventing me to shower my own daughter in the wealth she deserves!"

"What's with this nobles and wealth nonsense?!" Yuri had his sword pointed at the mage as he glared at him, "Do you even think that she would want all of those?!"

"Oh, she would! There's nobody in this world who doesn't like power and money!" Rey responded casually as he took a few steps back to reach the machine behind him, "I don't know her face anymore, but I still remember her name. All I need is to have the documents written under her name and I'm done with it!"

The mage had slammed his fist on the machine behind him, making the machine make loud noises, "W-What did you do?!"

"A simple self-destruct function to get rid of pests," Rey calmly replied as he let out a satisfied grin, "Let's just see if you can actually save the people here before this whole settlement explodes. Else, you can just run and save yourselves."

"S-Self-destruct?!"

"Damn it," Yuri cursed as he saw the mage running away from the shaking ground, "Come on, let's just get anyone we can and move out!"

"I understand," Judith nodded as she followed the three away from the battlefield, but looking back at the spot where the mage used to be as she ran,  _'Was he… was he the one you were trying to fix, Dad…?'_


	15. The Path to Choose

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit delay on the update, sorry!

The group along with the few survivors they could save made their way out of the settlement and through the earthquake caused by the explosion underground. The land collapsed, swallowing the remains of the abandoned settlement into a big crater filled with broken machines. Most of the settlement was gone and replaced by the crater, but some of the older buildings were still standing and enough for them and the survivors to set up a camp.

Flynn and his brigade arrived shortly with some extra supplies to help the survivors, especially with the available supplies in the settlement being inedible for human consumption. The trauma of being subjected to torture for years was still written on the survivors' faces, but they were also relieved from the help offered by the Knights. Their bad condition had prevented them from being moved to nearby towns immediately, so the group had to stay a night in the settlement to let the survivors recover.

The Knights didn't simply come with supplies, however, as they had some news to share with the group.

"What?!" Yuri looked at his friend in anger, but the emotion wasn't directed at the blond knight, "And everyone in the castle just accepted everything without any arguments?!"

Flynn shook his head calmly, "Not quite yet. The Council had requested him to bring the proposal document to make his research official and funded by the Empire."

"E-Even if people's lives are used to make those philosopher's stone?" Flynn gave Karol a saddened look, which was the answer he needed, "No way…"

The swordsman looked around restlessly at the commotion behind them. The survivors were being taken care of by Estelle and the others. His gaze stopped at the brunette mage as she stood away from the people with a book in her hands.

"We're not done yet. We can ask Rita to explain stuff about that mage… that other Mordio's shady research," Yuri turned back to Flynn, "We'll take the survivors along with us to Zaphias tomorrow before he can make everything official."

The blond nodded in agreement, "Very well. I'm coming with you all to meet the Council as well. For now, let's all rest here while waiting for the survivors to be well enough to move around."

"Got it," Yuri watched as Flynn left before turning his attention to the others.

Repede stayed by his side as Karol went back to lend a hand to the others with the various knowledge he had from being in many guilds in the past. Raven had joined in with the survivors, being the old man he had always been, though he took a few chances to ask the survivors a few questions of his own. Patty was helping with Estelle's needs to heal the injured ones as her mage friend was distancing herself away from the people.

Rita's eyes were still glued to the book in her hands, though the expression of disbelief was still on her face since he and Karol told the others about Rey's motives from before. It would be best to leave his explanation there, even if he was one of the two people who might've realized the connection between the two people bearing the name Mordio. It wasn't his initial decision to keep a few things a secret from her, but rather, another person who had been his battle partner other than Repede.

And that same person was nowhere in sight. He would've keep his nose out of her business, but the look on her face before she left was bothering him enough that he decided to look for her. Her saying that she was fine with that troubled look was a complete lie and he knew her well enough that she had never been a good liar.

* * *

She let out a sigh as she leaned on the wall near the place she was sitting. Her hand was resting on the handle of her Brionac as she looked ahead at the crater created by the explosion before. Their little adventure underground had taken some time that the sky had already turned dark by the time they made it outside. A rest after an eventful day would be nice for her, but not after her realization about her forgotten mission came up once more.

All she knew was that her father was a very dedicated researcher and a loving father. His curiosity had led him to invent the things that could destroy the world, even if he had intended to make the lives of others to be easier. The realization of his mistake had driven him away from her as he tried fixing his mistakes that she and her friends eventually fixed by giving up all of the blastia in Terca Lumireis, be it a Hermes blastia or not.

Then another mistake of his showed itself, but she wasn't sure how she could fix a human being. Her father couldn't have wished for a life to be erased over his own mistake and she personally couldn't take the life of a person as well. What was it that her father was trying to do to fix this Rey person? She couldn't really ask him anymore.

As Ba'ul flew by in the sky without the Fiertia with him, she let out a frown, "Why aren't you saying anything about all of this, Ba'ul?"

" _I'm sorry,"_  the Entelexeia's voice echoed in her mind,  _"He told me not to say anything to you in his last breath."_

"Why? If we had known, we could have avoided any unnecessary loss of lives."

" _He knew,"_  Ba'ul's voice sounded hesitant,  _"He couldn't do anything else to keep his partner from taking this path when he was already tainted in the inside. He was trying to do something else for his sake because he didn't want Mordio to make the same mistake as he did."_

"The same mistake?" she didn't get any response, leaving her mind as quiet as before, "Ba'ul, please tell me what mistake Dad had done in the past."

" _I cannot,"_  the Entelexeia broke the silence in her mind,  _"However, Hermes had left his last will in his study. It was the last thing he remembered telling me before…"_

"Then I need to look for it," she rose to her feet to leave the site, only to have familiar long dark hair being blown in her way.

She stopped in her tracks before she could be seen, though his presence there without any particular reason told her that he had known that she was there. She couldn't get out of the settlement now that she was found out and her father's last will would have to wait a little longer.

"So, Hermes is your dad, huh? That explains how you know a lot about Hermes blastia."

"Yes," Judith replied as she stood in her place, "I didn't say anything back then because I didn't feel like it was important enough to mention."

"And because that Rey guy is connected to your dad, I'm guessing you have some unfinished business with him," Yuri folded his arms as he leaned on the wall without looking at the Krytian, "Just so you know that if you leave right now, you're going to break one of the guild's laws."

He was right. Ba'ul would be the only way they could get everyone transported out of the settlement the next day quickly. If she left right away, she would get in the way of her friends and guild mates if they had somewhere to go in a hurry the next day. She wouldn't have known how long it would take for her to search into her father's destroyed study if she had left in the first place.

"I won't get in the way of the guild anymore. I've already made that vow before."

"And I was just in time to stop you from breaking that vow," Yuri's tone hadn't changed at all since the first time he talked that night, "You still need to decide what to do with that guy tomorrow, though. Are you going to punish him the way he did to many other people?"

To kill the person. He was asking her if she wanted to take the man's life the way he had done to her father and many other innocent lives who were turned into philosopher's stones. Having been in countless battles against monsters, killing them was easy and she would do it without thinking twice. When the one to be struck down was a person, it wasn't as easy as she would do to monsters. It wasn't about the difference of their strength, but rather, it was the life of a human being and possibly the life of a person connected to a dear friend of hers.

The life of a human being… She wasn't the only one who had been faced with a similar situation.

"What about you?" Judith responded as she turned her head to Yuri's direction, "It was you who gave the final judgment to Ragou and Cumore, wasn't it?"

There was a short pause before he answered, "Certain circumstances led me to do it."

"It wasn't just that you had the chance to do it?"

"Both," Yuri had stopped leaning on the wall as he stood up firmly, "If you're worried about me not having the chance for my revenge, then don't. I don't care who'll strike him down; it could be me or you. All that matters is that Rita isn't involved in this if he really is her dad."

The Krytian nodded, even without Yuri seeing it himself, "Yes. She doesn't know about him and it's best that she never knows."

"Then I need to tell Flynn about it, just in case," Yuri was about to leave the place when the sound of footsteps stopped him. When he turned around, Judith was standing there next to him, "Don't push yourself. If it's something you can't do on your own, you still have the guild to help. You're not on your own in this, Judy."

It was reassuring for her to hear it, though it was unusual to hear those words from him, especially when he was the first one to keep everything bottled up.

"That's quite unusual coming from you. Are you really the same Yuri Lowell that I know?" Judith asked with a teasing tone, prompting the swordsman to turn away from her.

"Yeah, I know it's weird," Yuri folded his arms once more before letting out a slight irritated sigh, "I think Flynn's persona is starting to rub off on me."

Judith let out a smile before she chuckled, "Thank you. I appreciate the thought," she dug into her pocket as she walked over to face him, handing out the old photo for him to take, "Here. I think you want to take this back."

"What's this thing?" Yuri took the old photo from her hand, rubbing off the remains of dust on the surface, before his eyes grew wide in surprise, "T-This…!"

He remembered the day clearly. It was the day when he and Flynn decided that they wanted to join the Knights when they grew up. Hanks had told them about the hardships of being a member of the Knights, but they were too stubborn to listen to him. Hanks' wife was there to support them, even as her health was already declining by then.

Yuri had forced on getting a ride for when he became a Knight, which ended with him riding on Hanks' back the entire day as his horse. Flynn was trying to get him down because Hanks still had some work to do, but the old man had put Flynn on top of him as well. Hanks' wife was keeping Yuri from falling all the time as Hanks' back wasn't wide enough to keep both of them on top of him.

A traveling merchant was there to take a sample picture for his customer, but because of how the four of them had their picture taken accidentally, Hanks' wife had insisted to buy the resulting picture for them. For as long as Yuri could remember, the picture had always been sitting by Hanks' bedside ever since.

"Judy, why did you have-" Yuri looked up to see that the Krytian was already gone, but replaced by the young guild leader looking up at him with a pained look on his face, "Boss…"

"I shouldn't be listening to your conversation, but…" Karol hung his head low, "I… I heard everything…"

"Are you going to stop us? I don't think we'll be going against the guild laws if we do it."

Karol stood in silence for a moment before starting once more, "I… I don't know… What I can say for now is that I've got the reason why Judith hasn't been doing much guild work lately."

"It's not just her," Yuri added as he looked at the crater, "I don't think anyone would be in the right mind to do something after having that kind of reality shoved right in front of them."

Karol nodded in agreement, "Yeah…" he looked up at Yuri once more with a concerned look, "But… are you going to do it again, Yuri? After all… you could kill a close family of our friend…"

The swordsman closed his eyes as his hands curled into fists, "I can't forgive them for what he did to Hanks and the others from the lower quarter. I don't care if he's doing it for others; he has to pay for what the murders he did."

"What about Rita?"

"I won't hold anything against her," Yuri had reopened his eyes as he turned to the other direction where the other people were, "She's not involved in the murders at all and it's purely that Rey Mordio's fault."

Karol stood in silence as Yuri left for the others, "Why… why does it have to end up like this again…?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Our favorite vigilante will be back in action! ... probably...


	16. Morality

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An on-time update this time! ... Well, sort of...?

The group had no time to lose the moment Ba'ul arrived in Zaphias. Flynn and his brigade took care of the victims they carried in Fiertia while the rest of the group headed for the castle. Going through the doors in the castle, they had made their way into the council meeting room where Rey and the members of the Council were.

The room was spacious and the sound of the door opening echoed in the room when the group barged into the room, making the Council members and the solitary mage by the round table at the other end of the room look at the newcomers.

"Hold it right there!" the brunette mage was the first one to charge into the room, "Don't agree to this creep's research just yet!"

"W-What…?" one of the members stood up from the round table he was sitting by with an unpleasant look on his face, seeing the pink-haired princess among the group, "What is the meaning of this?! Lady Estellise, please explain what is going on this instant!"

"Y-Yes!" Estelle was surprised at the Council member's stern tone, though she knew that the Council members were more willing to listen to the story when she was the one to talk, "Before all of you give this man the approval needed for the results of his research to be mass-produced, shouldn't the source of the energy be questioned as well?"

"There is no need!" Rey had turned to the group, still covering most of his facial features under his hood and goggles, "There are things that us mages should keep to ourselves in order to preserve originality and prevent plagiarism! I'll invoke that right to keep the secrets of my research!"

"But-"

"Miss Mordio," the Council member who had stood up looked at the brunette mage with a stern look, "I understand that you're a budding researcher as well, but I  _do_  hope that you will listen to other mages more experienced that you are."

Rita had wanted to say more, but the gazes of the other Council members in the room and forced her to stay silent. They weren't wrong when they mentioned that she had less experience being a part of the Imperial mages, but researching wasn't a new thing to her. It was something she had done for as long as she could remember, because it was the only thing that would never leave and betray her. Blastia was a part of most of her life and she wanted to do anything to bring back its theories in a way that wasn't harmful to the world.

No, she wanted to do it for Estelle's sake and the promise she had made to Judith. To carry on Hermes' legacy as a researcher.

The big doors behind them opened once more as the blond knight came in while accompanying a younger blond into the room, "Commandant Flynn had given me a report regarding the issues happening in the lower quarter area of Zaphias, as well as the abandoned settlement where the surviving refugees came from."

"Y-Your Majesty!"

"Ioder! Flynn!" Estelle was glad to see her cousin along with her friend coming in with them.

"I apologize for the wait," the knight had bowed at the Council members as Ioder went ahead to the meeting table, but not without the hooded mage glancing at him nervously as he passed by, "I believe we've met the other day, Mister Dior Morey… if you still prefer to be called by your pen name."

Rey clicked his tongue in annoyance as he looked back at the knight with the rest of the group behind him. He took another glance at the table where he had put his documents for the Council members to sign, seeing that Ioder was looking through them. He had originally thought that the Emperor himself wasn't involved with the group that he could manipulate him into agreeing to the research funds he proposed. Or at least, he could earn more money to remake his creations that would bring him more money in the guise of research funds. Seeing that he was connected, it would only be a matter of time before the true nature of his research was shown to the public eye. He couldn't let that happen, not when he had to risk everything and put a different name as the one to bring up the idea.

"Damn it!" Rey had forced his way out of the room, tackling between Yuri and the others as they tried stopping him from running away.

"Our prey's running away!" Patty had pointed out as the mage had left through the door, prompting the rest of the group to run after him.

"Hold it, Miss Mordio!" the Council member from before called out to the brunette, much to her annoyance, with Estelle stopping beside her as well, "I believe there is something else of importance you need to explain to His Majesty and the members of the Council."

"What kind of explanation do you guys want from me anyway?!" Rita replied as she raised her voice, pointing at the now-closed door, "If you want to talk about important stuff, taking care of that hoodie freak is more important!"

"Yuri and the others will take care of him," Flynn was the one to respond as he looked at her with confidence in his eyes, "Don't you believe in them as well?"

"T-That's…!" the mage had avoided his gaze, "But I need to…"

"Rita?" Estelle gave her a questioning look, "Is there something wrong?"

Rita wasn't sure if anything was wrong, but she had a weird feeling when she saw the mage's covered face. She wasn't the type of person to be interested in having nostalgic moments or anything similar, but she could've sworn that she had seen him in the past. Even with her childhood being filled with blastia research, she couldn't shake the feeling that she felt like she had known the person when she saw his goggles. They were the exact same as the ones she had found lying around in her house.

"N-No, nothing…" she pushed back the unclear memories deep into her mind as she tried not to look into Estelle's worried eyes. Rita looked back at the Council member as he held up a single piece of paper in his hand, showing her the contents written on it, "What's that?"

"That is the contract for requesting some research funds and patent rights," Ioder replied to her question, but his eyes were directed at the paper, "The topic of research for the funds is Dior Morey's, but the name of the requester is-"

"M-Me?!" Rita took the paper in surprise, seeing that it was really her name that was written at the bottom, "B-But I've never requested anything!"

"That is why we would need you to explain this discrepancy," the Council member replied before turning over to the emperor, "Your Majesty, we shall request for your thoughts on the matter as well as the report Commandant has given you."

"Very well."

* * *

"Are you serious? Even at times like this?!" Yuri had given the army of knights a glare as they had created a defensive wall, letting the mage slip out of their sight, "Look, I don't have time for this and we have to chase down a person!"

The swordsman had unsheathed his sword, pointing it at the unfazed knights for a battle, but Karol had stepped in before the fight had started, "W-Wait! If we're fighting the knights here then we might cause tension between the guilds and the Empire again! We can't take that kind of risk, especially not after we've just been recognized as a part of the Union!"

"One of Brave Vesperia's laws is to uphold justice, correct?" Judith had joined Yuri's side with her spear ready in her hands, "Wouldn't capturing the mage count as capturing a criminal in this case?"

"W-Well…" the young leader looked at her nervously, knowing that what she had said was true, though he wasn't planning on tarnishing his guild's name when they had finally got some recognition.

"Give it up and come with us, Yuri Lowell!" one of the knights had pointed his spear at Yuri's neck, who gave him a glare in return, "You and the rest of the trespassers are going to face the consequences should you try to-"

"GUOH!"

The knight turned around, seeing that a boulder had fallen out of nowhere and pinned down a few of them down, "W-What happened-GAH!"

A shower of arrows had rained on them, with the rest of the conscious knights having their weapons ready. As the two battle maniacs were ready to jump into the battle anytime, the young pirate and the old man of the group had stepped in with their own weapons ready, "Well, somebody's gotta need ta stay behind and entertain these guys, huh?"

"Old man!" Yuri called out to Raven, "But you're still involved in the Union and a member of Altosk too!"

"Oh, don't you worry about that!" Patty was spinning her gun confidently before aiming it at the knights, "If they say anything about this then I'm feeding them to the sharks!" she turned back to the swordsman with a wink, "You'd better come back soon, Yuri! I'll be waiting for you to for our smooth sailing of love!"

"Uh… sure…" he wasn't sure how to respond, though he was grateful for the two staying behind to keep the knights out of their way.

The remaining four of them made their way through the quiet hallways of the castle, with Repede tracking the mage's scent as they went. The mage hadn't attempted to hide and wait as Repede never caught his scent in any of the rooms. From the hallways they passed, they could tell that the mage didn't really know the way out of the castle despite being an Imperial mage. Either that, or he was trying to find another way out of the castle to escape.

Their chase had led them to the big audience chamber with two chandeliers hanging on the ceiling and a gigantic door on the other side of the room, where the group finally spotted the mage trying to open the door. Rey had noticed them coming as well, giving them a quick glance as they started catching up to him before going back to the door to finally open it up.

The chase ended at the top of the slope, with the mage realizing that he had hit a dead end unless he wanted to risk jumping off from the top of the castle. He sighed in defeat as he turned around to see the four members of Brave Vesperia had caught up to them, ready to fight.

"Looks like you're being persistent on chasing me even if doing it won't bring anyone back," Rey had his necklace ready, with the red philosopher's stone sitting in the middle of it, "You're still dumb to charge at me when fighting me also cost the life of the person within the philosopher's stone I have with me."

Judith was looking at him with a pained look on her face. Had she known the person she saved would turn out to be a serial-killing mage, she would reconsider her option on helping him back then. Taking him out would be her mission that she had forgotten, but the thought of taking out a human life was still making her hesitate.

"Thanks to your friend over there, I've managed to gain enough money for my daughter," Rey started as he looked at the Krytian before the expression on his face turned sour, "If only that you all stayed out of the way, she would inherit all my hard work while being bathed with the wealth my family never gets the chance of experiencing!"

"That's sounds so wrong!" Karol protested as he held his big hammer on his side, "Haven't you even consider what she would feel when the research she was given had involved taking the lives of others?"

"That won't be a problem if you leave my research alone and stay out of it!"

The mage lashed out at him before he set out big balls of fire at him, only to be met with Yuri's Frigid Blast attack. The ice melted from being exposed to the balls of fire, though it had reduced the damage caused to a harmless level. The steam caused from the two attacks' collision gave Judith the chance to strike as she kicked him to the air, but the mage was ready with rock pillars pushing her higher than her intended height.

The Krytian had quickly recovered before landing far behind the group, with Repede charging in with a powerful trust to knock the mage off balance. Karol had knocked a few balls at him, with one of them hitting his face hard enough that the goggles he was wearing went flying off when he fell on his back. Yuri had already stood nearby to send some projectiles from his sword, blowing to a semi-standing position for him to trust his sword at the mage before knocking him back down with his empty hand.

Judith had teleported above Rey as he landed, throwing her spear at him. The attack had bounced him off to the air, leading him to cast a quick spell to send icicles at her direction. The Krytian quickly went back to the ground and rushed towards him with her spear ready, but was stopped by a flaming dragon coming her way. She had tried blocking the attack to reduce the damage she took, but Repede had knocked her out of harm's way before quickly running towards the mage.

The dog spun himself in the air as he aimed for the philosopher's stone in his hand, knocking it off his hand. Yuri had sent a projectile towards the stone, breaking it apart to handicap the mage as he had nothing to enhance his strength. At least, that was what the four of them had in mind until the red gem in his eye glowed and the ground around them started shaking.

The four of them were knocked into the air by the stone pillars going up and down, but Judith wasn't helpless being in the air. She threw her spear once more at an angle, sending out burning projectiles around as it landed near the mage. Smoke had covered a small area where the impact was with Judith going into the smoke to both retrieve her spear and continue attacking.

Yuri had joined her as well, but he had crashed into her as they were forced out of the smoke by another flaming dragon. They landed far on the back near the slope on the other end of the platform, but they only needed a few seconds of recovery before rejoining the others on the battlefield. Karol and Repede were teaming up to give the mage a few beatings, though the injuries he suffered quickly disappeared when the red gem, the philosopher's stone in his eye, glowed.

A true team effort would be their next bet as the four of them charged in at once, quickly knocking him back to the edge of the platform. The mage didn't notice as he was too busy trying to cast more powerful spells at them, until Yuri had slipped past him and slashed the mage from behind. The swordsman had grabbed him as he gave him a flurry of punches which were quickly healed before Judith joined in with a full moon-like slash with her spear.

The mage sent the two flying once more with rock pillars followed by massive water wave at them, but Repede dashed through the wave like it was nothing before giving him a few slashes with his dagger, ending up with an upward slash for Karol to come rolling above the wave. The young leader landed his big hammer on the mage as the wave slowly disappeared before swinging his bag around to trap the mage in a vortex.

Repede jumped back and sent a few burning projectiles at him, before the dog ended up the attack by digging through the platform and sent rocks flying towards him. The mage landed on the platform with his healing slowing down from the number of attacks he was getting, though with an additional weight from Karol's hammer before thunder struck the mage as well.

The young leader jumped back as Yuri ran towards him to trust his sword into the mage, picking him up by the clothes before cutting him in an upward slash and aerial sword combo. A single punch ended the combo as the swordsman sent the mage forcefully back to the ground, where Judith was waiting to pick the mage up into the air with a spinning slash.

The Krytian ended the attack with a kick to the air, prompting her to jump and end the combined attack as she drove her spear down at him like a hammer.

"This is the end!"

The attack hit him hard on the stomach, sending his body to the ground before bouncing off the ground and rolled to the edge of the platform. The mage panicked as the philosopher's stone wasn't as quick as before in healing him that the pain persisted long enough to prevent him from stopping himself from rolling towards the edge.

Much to the four's shock, the mage had rolled off the edge and fell.

The Krytian looked on in shock, realizing what she had done, even if in the back of her mind, she felt that she needed to do it for the sake of her friends who had gotten hurt, "I… made him fall…"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided to cut down the in-game mechanics here for the sake of the fight's flow, even if it ends up being a lot longer than I expected... Well, at least the mage is gone now, right?


End file.
